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Archive: 2016 (139 Posts)

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Rare Object of the Month: Unrequited Love for the Ages

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following is a guest blog post written by Elizabeth Gettins, Library of Congress digital library specialist.)  This month, the Rare Book of the Month is not actually a book but objects from the special collections within the Rare Book and Special Collections Division. In honor of Valentine’s Day, we take a peek into the …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

A Valentine for the Ages: The Biblical “Song of Songs”

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following post is by Ann Brener, Hebraic area specialist in the Library’s African and Middle Eastern Division.) With its rich nature imagery and enigmatic dream-like sequences, the “Song of Songs” (also known as the “Songs of Solomon”) is surely one of the world’s great love poems and one of the most popular books in …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Library in the News: January 2016 Edition

Posted by: Erin Allen

January was a month filled with awards and honors. The Library welcomed Gene Luen Yang as the fifth National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. Michael Cavna of The Washington Post covered the inauguration ceremony and wrote, “Yang — a charismatic, high-energy speaker — was able to present himself dually as both authentically dimensional scholar and …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Trending: African American History Month

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following article by Audrey Fischer is from the January/February 2016 issue of the Library of Congress Magazine, LCM. You can read the issue in its entirety here.) One man’s dedication to a field of study inspired the moniker “the father of African American history.” With this year’s theme of “Hallowed Grounds: Sites of African …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

New Blog Series: New Online

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following is a guest post by William Kellum, manager in the Library’s Web Services Division.) This is the first post in a new monthly series highlighting new collections, items and presentations on the Library’s website. After checking out the items mentioned here, be sure to visit some of our other blogs that highlight our …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Pic of the Week: A Party of Pulitzers

Posted by: Erin Allen

Thirteen Pulitzer Prize winners visited the Library last week while in Washington for festivities celebrating the esteemed award. Steve Benson, who won the prize for editorial cartooning in 1993; former U.S. Poet Laureate Rita Dove (poetry, 1987); Jennifer Egan (fiction, 2011); Paul Giblin (local reporting, 2009); Joan Hedrick (biography, 1995); David Levering Lewis (biography, 1994 and 2001); Jeffrey Marx (investigative reporting, 1986); Philip Schultz …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Pic of the Week: #MyTradition

Posted by: Erin Allen

In celebration of its 40th anniversary, the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress (AFC) has launched year-long campaign asking Americans to share photos of their folk traditions. The campaign kicks off a year of events that will commemorate AFC’s four decades as the institution of record for American folk traditions and ensure that it …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

He Came From the Near East

Posted by: Erin Allen

(The following is a guest post written by Anchi Hoh, a program specialist in the African and Middle Eastern Division.) If you read last month’s Christmas-related blog post “An Armenian ‘Three Magi’ at the Library of Congress” by Levon Avdoyan, you may be wondering how the Library’s African and Middle Eastern Division acquired some of …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Pic of the Week: Willie Nelson on PBS Tonight!

Posted by: Erin Allen

Make sure to tune in to PBS tonight for the star-studded concert tribute to Willie Nelson, the 2015 recipient of the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. The concert airs on PBS stations nationwide at 9 p.m. ET on (check local listings). The program also will be broadcast at a later date via the American …