Julia Flynn Siler

 Twitter
Join Mailing List
  • HOME
  • AUTHOR
  • BOOKS
  • ARTICLES
  • BOOK CLUBS
  • NEWS
  • EVENTS
  • BLOG
  • SPEAKING
  • MEDIA
  • CONTACT
Follow Us on RSS

Recent Posts

  • The Safe Place That Became Unsafe
  • Remembering Judy Yung
  • The Queen’s Diaries
  • Talking with Min Jin Lee
  • Overcrowded prisons in our back yards

Recent Comments

  • Online Tributes – Judy Yung on Remembering Judy Yung
  • Online Tributes – Judy Yung on Remembering Judy Yung
  • Stephen M Stirling on “Are you wearing a mask…?”
  • linda Varonin on Overcrowded prisons in our back yards
  • Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson on The Bible as Literature (vs. Political Prop)

Archives

Guidebooks to Sin

April 5, 2017 by Julia Flynn Siler Leave a Comment

At opening night of the 2017 Tennessee Williams Festival in New Orleans, I met a librarian who also happens to be a champion ham kicker.

Pamela D. Arceneaux at the Williams Research Center in New Orleans

She shimmied her way onto the stage of Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre in New Orleans in a sparkly black top and full-length skirt. Channeling the spirit of one of her heroes, Mae West, she delivered a lively and ribald talk on a subject that has fascinated her for some 35 years: the “blue books” of Storyville, the red-light district of New Orleans that flourished from 1897-1917. The “blue books” were guidebooks to the prostitutes and brothels in the district

Continue Reading...

Filed Under: History, Literary Festivals, Performing, The Writing Life Tagged With: librarians, Libraries, Literary, Literary life, new orleans, red-light districts, storyville, Tennessee Williams /New Orleans Literary Festival

The end of the library (as we know it?)

October 19, 2016 by Julia Flynn Siler 1 Comment

Ralph Lewin, executive director of the Mechanics' Institute, photo courtesy of the Sacramento Bee.

Ralph Lewin at the Mechanics’ Institute, photo courtesy of the Sacramento Bee.

A few months ago, San Francisco’s venerable Mechanics’ Institute hosted a discussion titled “The End of the Library (As We Know It)?”

As the oldest library in the city of San Francisco, the Mechanics’ Institute founded in 1854 and opened a year later with a grand total of four books, a chess room, and a mission to offer vocational education to out-of-work gold miners. (The San Francisco Public Library was founded more than two decades later, in 1879.) As one of the oldest libraries in the state, the Mechanics’ was a fitting place for this discussion.

Continue Reading...

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Bancroft Library, California State Library, librarians, Libraries, Mechanics' Institute, research, San Francisco Public Library, U.C. Berkeley

Copyright © 2021 Julia Flynn Siler
Terms of Service & Privacy Policy | Data Access Request