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Nominations are now open through September 20 for the 2010 Carnegie Corporation of New York/New York Times I Love My Librarian Award.

The award really is a big deal:up to 10 librarians in public, school, college, community college and university libraries nationwide will win $5,000 and be honored at an award reception in New York, hosted by The New York Times.

Gregory Maguire, author of the novels Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West – which was turned into a hit Broadway musical - and Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, discusses his love of libraries in this video.

Photo:Carnegie Library, Murray City, Utah, circa 1921

Illustration: 

Last year, 3,200 library lovers nationwide submitted nominations for their librarians for the Carnegie Corporation of New York/New York Times I Love My Librarian Award.  If you missed the opportunity last year, guess what?  The 2010 nominations are now open.

Julie Powell, author of "Julie & Julia" and her new memoir, "Cleaving," talks about the role that libraries have played in her life and career. She used the archives at the Schlesinger Library to research "Julie & Julia" and often works at the New York Public Library.
 

Via Tame The Web comes this tale of how a library made a very practical, immediate difference for two Italian teens visiting the U.S. for the summer. They went to the library to use the public computers, but intrepid librarian Justin Hoenke suspected they might want something more. Justin writes:

"Enter Google Translate.  It started with one simple message:

Ti prego di perdonarmi. Non parlo italiano, ma spero che se io uso questo strumento posso parlare con voi.

Libraries have played a pivotal role in the life of Elizabeth Gilbert, author of the best-selling memoir, Eat, Pray, Love. In her youth, she learned to read and experienced her first kiss at her local library. She wrote her first two novels at the New York Public Library which provided refuge from her cramped and noisy apartment.

Linda Holmes, who writes the NPR entertainment and pop-culture blog Monkey See, says libraries may be "standing on the edge of their pop culture moment: Librarians prepare."

John Grisham, author of The Pelican Brief and The Firm, among other novels, talks about libraries at the 2010 ALA Annual Conference in Washington, D.C.