Prof. Tom Reed to Lead Discussion of Novel
Posted by admin on Aug 30, 2006
The next book read by Brown Bag Book Club will be
March by Geraldine Brooks. The club will meet on Tuesday, Sept.
19th at Noon in the Library Special Collections Room.
Bring your lunch and join us for a conversation about this
new, highly recommended novel. The
discussion will be led by Prof. Tom Reed. Civil War buffs, lovers of literature and voracious readers welcome!
From Publishers Weekly Starred Review. Brooks’ luminous second novel, after 2001’s acclaimed
Year of Wonders, imagines the Civil War experiences of Mr. March, the absent
father in Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women. An idealistic Concord cleric, March
becomes a Union chaplain and later finds himself assigned to be a teacher on a
cotton plantation that employs freed slaves, or “contraband.” His
narrative begins with cheerful letters home, but March gradually reveals to the
reader what he does not to his family: the cruelty and racism of Northern and
Southern soldiers, the violence and suffering he is powerless to prevent and
his reunion with Grace, a beautiful, educated slave whom he met years earlier
as a Connecticut peddler to the plantations. In between, we learn of March’s
earlier life: his whirlwind courtship of quick-tempered Marmee, his friendship
with Emerson and Thoreau and the surprising cause of his family’s genteel
poverty. When a Confederate attack on the contraband farm lands March in a
Washington hospital, sick with fever and guilt, the first-person narrative
switches to Marmee, who describes a different version of the years past and an
agonized reaction to the truth she uncovers about her husband’s life. Brooks, who
based the character of March on Alcott’s transcendentalist father, Bronson,
relies heavily on primary sources for both the Concord and wartime scenes; her
characters speak with a convincing 19th-century formality, yet the narrative is
always accessible. Through the shattered dreamer March, the passion and rage of
Marmee and a host of achingly human minor characters, Brooks’ affecting,
beautifully written novel drives home the intimate horrors and ironies of the
Civil War and the difficulty of living honestly with the knowledge of human
suffering.
Copyright © Reed Business Information
New look to LegalTrac
Posted by admin on Aug 29, 2006
LegalTrac is an index to legal journals and newspapers. It is a great
resource for finding journal articles on a particular subject because
subject headings have been assigned to each article.
This database was recently revamped with a new look and layout which
has made it easier to navigate. Some full-text articles are available
in the database, but for thoses articles not available in full-text,
there is a link to the Widener’s library catalog so you can determine of the
library owns the title or if we have online access through another
database. LegalTrac is available on the libraryís database page.
[Off campus access to LegalTrac is limited to current Widener Law
School faculty, students and staff and requires login with a Widener ID
card.]
US Law Week free for Widener Law Students!
Posted by admin on Aug 15, 2006
Widenerís law students can get U.S. Law Week sent to them by email for
FREE! U.S. Law Week is a weekly summary and analysis of current
law, including the full text of U.S. Supreme Court decisions.
Attorneys pay more than $1000 annually for this same service.
To sign up for U.S. Law Week, go to the libraryís BNA Research page
and follow the link at the top of the page for BNA News Service, enter
your email address and select the titles youíd like to receive. Contact
Maggie Stewart, Reference and Outreach Librarian, if you have any
questions: (302)477-2039 or mmstewart@widener.edu
Update 8/22/06: Delaware’s claim that Freedom of Information Act
requests are only available to citizens of the state has been denied by
the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Read about it this
week’s issue of U.S. Law Week. [Off campus access limited to Widener Faculty, Students and Staff with a current Widener ID card. Sign in required]
Join the Law Library Book Club in Reading The Tipping Point
Posted by admin on Aug 2, 2006
The book club will meet in the Library Special Collections Room on Tuesday, August 15. Please join us.
This month we will read and discuss, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, by Malcolm Gladwell.
“The best way to understand the dramatic transformation of unknown books into bestsellers, or the rise of teenage smoking, or the phenomena of word of mouth or any number of the other mysterious changes that mark everyday life,” writes Malcolm Gladwell, “is to think of them as epidemics. Ideas and products and messages and behaviors spread just like viruses do.” Although anyone familiar with the theory of memetics will recognize this concept, Gladwell’s The Tipping Point has quite a few interesting twists on the subject.