Snuggle up with the classics

Originally published in the Ketchikan Daily News, December 2020; written by Michelle Lampton.

It’s that time of year: It’s cold and damp out, and most of us want to hibernate. That makes a perfect time to meander up to the UAS Ketchikan Campus Library for a book to snuggle up with. And if you’re looking for classic literature, this is where the Campus Library shines. We have well over four thousand volumes of, and on, both old and new classics. From Milton to Michener, Margaret Bell to William Shakespeare, Twain to Tennessee Williams, Stephen King to Franz Kafka, we have adventure and romance, horror and drama, humor and tragedy.

Curl up on the couch and hold a hundred-year old copy of “The Wind in the Willows,” enjoying the tactical experience of the gold gilding on the spine and the rough-cut pages against your thumbs. Or, hide under the blankets while burying your nose in Stephen King’s “It.” Want to feel a bit warmer? Check out “Sons of Sinbad,” and spend some time away in the sun and warm waters of Arabia. One of our patrons enjoyed checking the title out so much, they even submitted this review to us:

“The year was 1938. The author, Alan Viliers, had spent much of his life as an Australian captain aboard some of the last European and American sailing ships plying the seven seas, and seeing that era give over to the steam ship and other motorized vessels, he knew he did not have much time to explore the unpretentious and, to the European, unacknowledged world of Eastern sailing ships. Viliers provides a unique perspective as an outsider not fluent in Arabic, traveling with others in highly cramped conditions, eating their food, watching them pray, taking part in their life, illnesses, deaths, and trying with some difficulty to understand the mysterious activities that have occurred along that trade route for thousands of years. Viliers’ observations remain pertinent today, and his approach reminds us to be slow to judge others, for if we come to know them in their own hardships, faith, and culture, we may be surprised at their goodness, and even be able to see our own shortcomings more clearly.”

We truly do have so many gems on the shelves. For example, newly arriving is a book from Cambridge Press which reprints Dicken’s “Great Expectations” in its original newspaper serialization. Whether you want to delve into “Dracula,” find meaning with Faust, or transport yourself to different eras and cultures with Dostoevsky, Dumas, Alcott, or Angelou, we have plenty to keep you tucked in and happy through the remaining winter months.

So, Happy New Year from the Campus Library Staff. Your First City Libraries Card works with us, and we hope to see you here browsing the shelves soon. Our titles can also be placed on hold and transported to the Public Library for you to pick up.