Fiction_L Archives Readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" (was: The Depraved Habit of Reading Novels) Dates: 2/25/04,1:26 PM  through  2/26/04,12:11 PM  (13 postings) Search for: Select one or more indexes to search: 2011-current     2009-2010     2004-2008    1995-2003    (Matches from each index will be displayed separately in the results page.) Return to February 2004 thread menu   |   Fiction_L Archives Menu

FROM: "Smith, Jeff" <[removed]@marshall.usc.edu>
REC'D: 2/25/04, 1:26 PM

Can anyone suggest readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" by William L. Peirce? My patron, a Mr. McVeigh, says he found that book inspiring and wants to read more like it.

OK, no, it's a trick question. In truth, I'm sympathetic to the view that librarians should just help their patrons without making moral judgments about what they read. (It's a tougher call with teachers, who are choosing books for impressionable others and deciding how to frame discussion of them.) However, I'm curious as to what the best RA response would be if a patron came in looking for stuff like this -- "Turner" being the violently racist fantasy about the glorious day when whites rise up to "take back" the U.S. while hunting down and lynching people of color. Reportedly it was Timothy McVeigh's favorite. Would librarians feel obliged to put just as much effort into rounding up more such appalling garbage, if asked, as they spend on more more conventional requests? Would "our library doesn't carry that kind of thing," if true (?), be an appropriate response? And how would you answer if the patron asked "Why not?" or "What do you mean, 'that kind of thing'?" In short, is there any point at which a book's moral repugnance would become an issue for librarians, and if so, how would that be expressed?

JS
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FROM: "Barb Borg-Jenkins, South Haven Public Library" <[removed]@pcpls.lib.in.us>
REC'D: 2/25/04, 1:55 PM

As a matter of fact, we did get a request for that book within a few
weeks of the Oklahoma City bombing. I made an Interlibrary loan request
and the request came unfilled.

It's not up to us to make the judgment on the book request.

Barbara Borg-Jenkins
South Haven Public Library
Valparaiso, IN 46385

Smith, Jeff wrote:

>
>Can anyone suggest readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" by William L. Peirce? My patron, a Mr. McVeigh, says he found that book inspiring and wants to read more like it.
>
>OK, no, it's a trick question. In truth, I'm sympathetic to the view that librarians should just help their patrons without making moral judgments about what they read. (It's a tougher call with teachers, who are choosing books for impressionable others and deciding how to frame discussion of them.) However, I'm curious as to what the best RA response would be if a patron came in looking for stuff like this -- "Turner" being the violently racist fantasy about the glorious day when whites rise up to "take back" the U.S. while hunting down and lynching people of color. Reportedly it was Timothy McVeigh's favorite. Would librarians feel obliged to put just as much effort into rounding up more such appalling garbage, if asked, as they spend on more more conventional requests? Would "our library doesn't carry that kind of thing," if true (?), be an appropriate response? And how would you answer if the patron asked "Why not?" or "What do you mean, 'that kind of thing'?" In short, is there any point at which a book's moral repugnance would become an issue for librarians, and if so, how would that be expressed?
>
>JS
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>
>
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FROM: Spencer Ms Martha <[removed]@usmc-mccs.org>
REC'D: 2/25/04, 2:40 PM

We had a request here for two books on how to make bombs within two days of
the bombing in Oklahoma City. I was morally opposed to getting the books,
but under direction by higher authority requested the books. We managed to
get one of them. It was a nineteenth century doorstop and the other, The
Anarchist's Cookbook, was missing. We recently had a request to buy The
Turner Diaries but haven't found a source for it.

Martha

-----Original Message-----
From: Smith, Jeff [[removed]@marshall.usc.edu]
Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2004 2:14 PM
To: Fiction_L
Subject: Readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" (was: The Depraved Habit of
Reading Novels)


Can anyone suggest readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" by William L. Peirce?
My patron, a Mr. McVeigh, says he found that book inspiring and wants to
read more like it.

OK, no, it's a trick question. In truth, I'm sympathetic to the view that
librarians should just help their patrons without making moral judgments
about what they read. (It's a tougher call with teachers, who are choosing
books for impressionable others and deciding how to frame discussion of
them.) However, I'm curious as to what the best RA response would be if a
patron came in looking for stuff like this -- "Turner" being the violently
racist fantasy about the glorious day when whites rise up to "take back" the
U.S. while hunting down and lynching people of color. Reportedly it was
Timothy McVeigh's favorite. Would librarians feel obliged to put just as
much effort into rounding up more such appalling garbage, if asked, as they
spend on more more conventional requests? Would "our library doesn't carry
that kind of thing," if true (?), be an appropriate response? And how would
you answer if the patron asked "Why not?" or "What do you mean, 'that kind
of thing'?" In short, is there any point at which a book's moral repugnance
would become an issue for librarians, and if so, how would that be
expressed?

JS

FROM: "Smith, Jeff" <[removed]@marshall.usc.edu>
REC'D: 2/25/04, 2:50 PM

>As a matter of fact, we did get a request for that book within a few
>weeks of the Oklahoma City bombing. I made an Interlibrary
>loan request
>and the request came unfilled.
>
>It's not up to us to make the judgment on the book request.
>
>Barbara Borg-Jenkins
>South Haven Public Library
>Valparaiso, IN 46385
>

Hello, Valparaiso, where I was born and went to college. As a scholar who's had to look at some pretty awful stuff in the course of research, I've depended on librarians helping me hunt that stuff up, and agree there should be no judgments about individual book requests. But what I asked was, would you go to the same trouble to find readalikes as you normally do? Would you feel duty-bound to spend time finding the patron -- who was clearly reading it for pleasure -- more such racist, sadistic or otherwise repellant fiction? Or: Can librarians legitimately decide that some requests aren't worth their time and energy, just as some books aren't worth their library's shelf space?

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FROM: Kathleen Stipek <[removed]@exchange.acld.lib.fl.us>
REC'D: 2/25/04, 3:19 PM

I've never had request for an item that was so offensive to me that I could
not, without doing violence to my principles, assist a patron in finding
readalikes for it, if any were to be found. I am sure that there are
authors and titles out there that I would have to ask a colleague to deal
with, as there might be others that colleagues would ask me to deal with.
In my capacity as ILL librarian I have ordered materials whose titles made
my skin crawl, and we have loaned materials that made me wonder about the
publisher. Libraries need a mechanism in place that will keep individual
librarians from having to violate their consciences and yet allow patrons to
obtain the materials they require.

Kathleen Stipek, Alachua County Library District (FMG), 401 East University
Avenue, Gainesville, Florida 32601 (352-334-3939; fax 352-334-3948)

"Non, merci."
--Cyrano de Bergerac

-----Original Message-----
From: Smith, Jeff [[removed]@marshall.usc.edu]
Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2004 3:50 PM
To: Fiction_L
Subject: RE: Readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" (was: The Depraved
Habit of Reading Novels)

>As a matter of fact, we did get a request for that book within a few
>weeks of the Oklahoma City bombing. I made an Interlibrary
>loan request
>and the request came unfilled.
>
>It's not up to us to make the judgment on the book request.
>
>Barbara Borg-Jenkins
>South Haven Public Library
>Valparaiso, IN 46385
>

Hello, Valparaiso, where I was born and went to college. As a scholar who's
had to look at some pretty awful stuff in the course of research, I've
depended on librarians helping me hunt that stuff up, and agree there should
be no judgments about individual book requests. But what I asked was, would
you go to the same trouble to find readalikes as you normally do? Would you
feel duty-bound to spend time finding the patron -- who was clearly reading
it for pleasure -- more such racist, sadistic or otherwise repellant
fiction? Or: Can librarians legitimately decide that some requests aren't
worth their time and energy, just as some books aren't worth their library's
shelf space?
5睶.n+ ˛
mj!6b==ীX*'.mb"ypyگ*+

FROM: "Deborah T. Walsh" <[removed]@geneva.lib.il.us>
REC'D: 2/25/04, 4:10 PM

Often, when trying to find readalikes for a patron, we discover that the
book is unusual, for any number of reasons, and there are no other books
that will provide the same appeal characteristics. I am not uncomfortable
saying to someone "this book (insert title) is rather extraordinary and I
don't know that we are going to find something just like it for you."

If readers' advisors focuses the request for clarification on appeal
characteristics, I suppose we have to be ready for a patron who says "I want
books that describe people being hurt, or, I like books where women are
raped" - or whatever other unpleasant thing you can think of to add here. I
guess I'm having a hard time imagining that RA transaction but, the truth
is, if asked, I can find books where people are hurt, or women are raped.
So can you.

After I had heard the appeal characteristics the patron was willing or able
to verbalize, and if I honestly couldn't discover anything using our usual
resources (including Fiction_L) I would not apologize for "failing." I
would spend no more or no less time on this request than any other of its
sort. It's wonderful to find readalikes and feel that we are serving our
patrons successfully, the truth is, sometimes we can't, because there aren't
any.

Deborah T. Walsh
Geneva Public Library District
Geneva, IL
[removed]@geneva.lib.il.us

FROM: Kathleen Stipek <[removed]@exchange.acld.lib.fl.us>
REC'D: 2/25/04, 4:16 PM

Well said! Now and then we shred ourselves trying to come up with an
answer, and sometimes the only answer is "we don't have a source for that."

Kathleen Stipek, Alachua County Library District (FMG), 401 East University
Avenue, Gainesville, Florida 32601 (352-334-3939; fax 352-334-3948)

"Non, merci."
--Cyrano de Bergerac

-----Original Message-----
From: Deborah T. Walsh [[removed]@geneva.lib.il.us]
Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2004 5:13 PM
To: Fiction_L
Subject: Re: Readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" (was: The Depraved
Habit of Reading Novels)

Often, when trying to find readalikes for a patron, we discover that the
book is unusual, for any number of reasons, and there are no other books
that will provide the same appeal characteristics. I am not uncomfortable
saying to someone "this book (insert title) is rather extraordinary and I
don't know that we are going to find something just like it for you."

If readers' advisors focuses the request for clarification on appeal
characteristics, I suppose we have to be ready for a patron who says "I want
books that describe people being hurt, or, I like books where women are
raped" - or whatever other unpleasant thing you can think of to add here. I
guess I'm having a hard time imagining that RA transaction but, the truth
is, if asked, I can find books where people are hurt, or women are raped.
So can you.

After I had heard the appeal characteristics the patron was willing or able
to verbalize, and if I honestly couldn't discover anything using our usual
resources (including Fiction_L) I would not apologize for "failing." I
would spend no more or no less time on this request than any other of its
sort. It's wonderful to find readalikes and feel that we are serving our
patrons successfully, the truth is, sometimes we can't, because there aren't
any.

Deborah T. Walsh
Geneva Public Library District
Geneva, IL
[removed]@geneva.lib.il.us

FROM: JCURTIN <[removed]@cuyahoga.lib.oh.us>
REC'D: 2/25/04, 5:10 PM

I figured out this was a trick question from the beginning. As a reference
issue, I would have to comply with the patron's request, whether or not I
deemed it an unsavory subject. However, you cannot judge from a simple
request what the patron's needs are -- whether they are doing research for a
paper, for instance, or if they intend mischief. They may be asking out of
mere curiosity, or because the item had been recommended by somebody else.
Just because someone is looking for Mein Kampf doesn't mean they are a Nazi.

Joan Curtin

FROM: David Wright <[removed]@yahoo.com>
REC'D: 2/26/04, 12:36 AM

I'm late to the thread, but I have a great (long)
story re: Turner Diaries and intellectual
freedom. Back in college I inherited a Banned
Books reading series as a part of a regular
Saturday night cabaret - the reader, now me,
would get up and typically read some passage from
some innocuous book, and the students would scoff
and jeer at how moronic and backward the censors
were. It was fun.
Well, it struck me that this was really a
lot of cheap complacent sniping and entirely
missed the point re: Intellectual Freedom, and so
made it my business to work my way towards
something that would be offensive to the audience
themselves, to bring the message home. I started
to incorporate tag lines like "Would you let your
child read this?" or "Would you want this in your
library," amidst the readings of One Flew Over
the Cuckoo's Nest and Catcher in the Rye. Then I
read some stuff from Huck Finn. Okay - most of
them got the irony - it is pretty hard to miss
with a reading - but there was still a little
self-concious sqirming when this white guy read
the word 'nigger' in a racially mixed crowd.
Next week - Naked Lunch - which I think just
baffled most of them - but enough folks seemed
discomfited by my asking "Would you let your
child read this?"
For the grand finale, I did a reading from
'The Turner Diaries,' a book that was sure to
offend - no - shock most of the audience. My
point was pretty obvious - if you really think
you believe in Free Speech, this is what you're
defending. Here was a book that wasn't on any of
the banned book lists, but was effectively banned
in most public libraries by common unspoken
consent. It isn't revisionist history - it is a
novel - a work of imagination - in this case a
racist and xenophobic imagination. So what'll it
be - Free Speech, or are you prepared to admit
that most of us believe in Free Speech within
bounds? Not such a complex idea, right?
Well, I tell you, easily half of the
audience didn't get it. Even with my explanatory
remarks about why this was about free speech,
they didn't get it. They were stunned and
appalled. I was repeatedly questioned in the
weeks to come about the nature of my own personal
beliefs and views. I was attacked in letters to
the campus paper.
I love banned books week, and I love the
public attention our banned books displays get,
and I think that it is an important
awareness-raising event. I wouldn't want to
change it. But we must admit, it is shooting
fish in a barrel, and preaching to the choir. An
honest-to-god banned books display would be
packed with The Turner Diaries and the like...

David Wright

--- "Smith, Jeff" <[removed]@marshall.usc.edu>
wrote:
>
> Can anyone suggest readalikes for "The Turner
> Diaries" by William L. Peirce? My patron, a Mr.
> McVeigh, says he found that book inspiring and
> wants to read more like it.
>
> OK, no, it's a trick question. In truth, I'm
> sympathetic to the view that librarians should
> just help their patrons without making moral
> judgments about what they read. (It's a tougher
> call with teachers, who are choosing books for
> impressionable others and deciding how to frame
> discussion of them.) However, I'm curious as to
> what the best RA response would be if a patron
> came in looking for stuff like this -- "Turner"
> being the violently racist fantasy about the
> glorious day when whites rise up to "take back"
> the U.S. while hunting down and lynching people
> of color. Reportedly it was Timothy McVeigh's
> favorite. Would librarians feel obliged to put
> just as much effort into rounding up more such
> appalling garbage, if asked, as they spend on
> more more conventional requests? Would "our
> library doesn't carry that kind of thing," if
> true (?), be an appropriate response? And how
> would you answer if the patron asked "Why not?"
> or "What do you mean, 'that kind of thing'?" In
> short, is there any point at which a book's
> moral repugnance would become an issue for
> librarians, and if so, how would that be
> expressed?
>
> JS
>
5睶�.n�+����˛���m�j�!����b�������X��*'.m��߉�b�ypy�گ*+

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Get better spam protection with Yahoo! Mail.
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FROM: "christine jeffords" <[removed]@hotmail.com>
REC'D: 2/26/04, 10:44 AM

>From: Kathleen Stipek <[removed]@exchange.acld.lib.fl.us>
>Reply-To: "Fiction_L" <[removed]@maillist.webrary.org>
>To: Fiction_L <[removed]@maillist.webrary.org>
>Subject: RE: Readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" (was: The Depraved Habit
> of Reading Novels)
>Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2004 16:13:18 -0500
>
>Libraries need a mechanism in place that will keep individual
>librarians from having to violate their consciences and yet allow patrons
>to
>obtain the materials they require.
>

I've often thought that nowadays, with the ubiquity of computers, there's
absolutely no reason the private patron couldn't access the central database
himself, search for the book/s he wanted, and have them mailed directly to
his home. The RA librarian's work would remain pretty much the same:
helping him to find out what books were "like" the ones he had enjoyed.

_________________________________________________________________
Watch high-quality video with fast playback at MSN Video. Free!
http://click.atdmt.com/AVE/go/onm00200365ave/direct/01/

FROM: Dennis Lien <[removed]@tc.umn.edu>
REC'D: 2/26/04, 11:05 AM

At 03:29 PM 2/25/04 -0500, you wrote:
>We had a request here for two books on how to make bombs within two days of
>the bombing in Oklahoma City. I was morally opposed to getting the books,
>but under direction by higher authority requested the books. We managed to
>get one of them. It was a nineteenth century doorstop and the other, The
>Anarchist's Cookbook, was missing. We recently had a request to buy The
>Turner Diaries but haven't found a source for it.
>
>Martha

ABEbooks.com shows at least thirteen copies currently offered for
sale by various used book dealers, seven of which range from $10
to $15 each. Published variously by Barricade Books in New York
and/or in Fort Lee, N.J.; by National Alliance in Washington DC;
and by National Vanguard Books in Hillsboro, West Virginia. The
last is the most recent (1999 publication date).

I'll admit that, if I were asked for a "readalike for THE TURNER
DIARIES," that I'd be fairly stumped. The only thing that comes
to mind is to suggest Norman Spinrad's THE IRON DREAM and hope (?)
that the requestor didn't recognize Spinrad's deadpan irony.

(For those who don't know, the premise of THE IRON DREAM is that
in an alternate world, Adolf Hitler became a pulp science fiction
writer and THE IRON DREAM is his best-known novel, full of
Ubermensch earthmen happily committing mass genocide on "lesser"
races in the process of fulfilling the destiny of their blood
or somesuch.)

Dennis Lien / U of Minnesota Libraries // [removed]@tc.umn.edu

FROM: Kathleen Stipek <[removed]@exchange.acld.lib.fl.us>
REC'D: 2/26/04, 11:49 AM

Well, whoever liked Turner might like John Ross's Unintended Consequences
which demonizes the Feds, glorifies militia types, and has a cover of an
un-subtlety that rivals a bodice-ripper. We've ILLed it a few times, and
I've dipped into it in passing. It's another tract and runs to 800+ pages.

Kathleen Stipek, Alachua County Library District (FMG), 401 East University
Avenue, Gainesville, Florida 32601 (352-334-3939; fax 352-334-3948)

"Non, merci."
--Cyrano de Bergerac

-----Original Message-----
From: Dennis Lien [[removed]@tc.umn.edu]
Sent: Thursday, February 26, 2004 12:03 PM
To: Fiction_L
Subject: RE: Readalikes for "The Turner Diaries" (was: The Depraved
Habit of Reading Novels)

At 03:29 PM 2/25/04 -0500, you wrote:
>We had a request here for two books on how to make bombs within two days of
>the bombing in Oklahoma City. I was morally opposed to getting the books,
>but under direction by higher authority requested the books. We managed to
>get one of them. It was a nineteenth century doorstop and the other, The
>Anarchist's Cookbook, was missing. We recently had a request to buy The
>Turner Diaries but haven't found a source for it.
>
>Martha

ABEbooks.com shows at least thirteen copies currently offered for
sale by various used book dealers, seven of which range from $10
to $15 each. Published variously by Barricade Books in New York
and/or in Fort Lee, N.J.; by National Alliance in Washington DC;
and by National Vanguard Books in Hillsboro, West Virginia. The
last is the most recent (1999 publication date).

I'll admit that, if I were asked for a "readalike for THE TURNER
DIARIES," that I'd be fairly stumped. The only thing that comes
to mind is to suggest Norman Spinrad's THE IRON DREAM and hope (?)
that the requestor didn't recognize Spinrad's deadpan irony.

(For those who don't know, the premise of THE IRON DREAM is that
in an alternate world, Adolf Hitler became a pulp science fiction
writer and THE IRON DREAM is his best-known novel, full of
Ubermensch earthmen happily committing mass genocide on "lesser"
races in the process of fulfilling the destiny of their blood
or somesuch.)

Dennis Lien / U of Minnesota Libraries // [removed]@tc.umn.edu

FROM: Kathleen Stipek <[removed]@exchange.acld.lib.fl.us>
REC'D: 2/26/04, 12:11 PM

Some years ago, I attended an ILL meeting where a person announced with
pride that her shop not only didn't catalog genre fiction so nobody would
borrow it from them but they didn't borrow it for their patrons, either. I
shot up in the air and asked if her shop had ever considered that there
might be a freelance scholar in her area who was writing the definitive book
on the Harlequin Romance in popular literature, and that they might be
impeding serious literary research. I got a long stare. True, most of the
people we get who borrow genre titles are reading for pleasure, but
somewhere at the back of my mind is that freelance scholar.

Kathleen Stipek, Alachua County Library District (FMG), 401 East University
Avenue, Gainesville, Florida 32601 (352-334-3939; fax 352-334-3948)

"Non, merci."
--Cyrano de Bergerac

-----Original Message-----
From: JCURTIN [[removed]@cuyahoga.lib.oh.us]
Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2004 6:08 PM
To: Fiction_L
Subject: RE: Turner Diaries

I figured out this was a trick question from the beginning. As a reference
issue, I would have to comply with the patron's request, whether or not I
deemed it an unsavory subject. However, you cannot judge from a simple
request what the patron's needs are -- whether they are doing research for a
paper, for instance, or if they intend mischief. They may be asking out of
mere curiosity, or because the item had been recommended by somebody else.
Just because someone is looking for Mein Kampf doesn't mean they are a Nazi.

Joan Curtin

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