My Story—Unexpected Finds at the Library

This entry is the companion piece to “Ode to the Public Library.”

While writing my dissertation in the mid-1980’s, I had a carrel at the Morris Library where I kept books and other research materials. I learned to allow an extra 20 minutes for working because I knew I would get distracted walking through the amazing maze of stacks. As I purposefully strode in or out, titles could leap off of the shelves, stopping me dead in my tracks. In addition to finding necessary research on my dissertation topic, the Old French fabliaux—basically a funny story, usually bawdy—I found unexpected treasures on these frequent treks through the stacks.

One such title, “Dead Lovers are Faithful Lovers,” remains in my personal library to this day. The work by Frances Newman published in 1928 explores an issue not totally irrelevant today. Should a woman cultivate beauty and social grace in order to better complement her husband—perhaps become a trophy wife? Or should a woman develop an intellectual life and risk becoming an old maid? Later, when I taught Literature of the American South, I cited this title when discussing the history of this literature.

NOTE: Flannery O’Connor, a budding cartoonist before she settled in to writing fiction, poked fun at the tension between beauty and intellect. In one cartoon, she pictures a woman seated alone while dancing couples swirl in the background.  With a twinkle in her eye, the woman comments, “Oh well, I can always be a Ph. D.”

Another such title, John Lennon’s “In His Own Write/A Spaniard in the Works” (copyright 1963 and 1964) also remains in my personal library. (“Spaniard” plays on the British word for wrench, “spanner.”) Not only was Lennon a talented lyricist and musician, but a quirky writer and artist, as well. In this thin double volume, Lennon delights in the vagaries of language, adding his unique illustrations to many pieces. In one piece, “At the Denis,” he writes of an exchange between a dentist and a woman with a toothache. Ever since I read this story, I write “denis” on my calendar when I have a dental appointment.

Another unexpected find in the stacks came not in the form of a printed book, but in the form of a pair of nylon, lacy, bikini underwear, tucked away at the end of a shelf. I can only imagine the story those panties might tell! As for myself, I will restrict my pleasures in the library to those of discovery and learning. I will leave pleasures of the flesh to other venues.