Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Norton + Noton (for Norton)

Andre Norton was the pen name of Alice Mary Norton, the "Grande Dame of Science Fiction and Fantasy." The original geek girl, Norton additionally went by the names Andrew North and Allen Weston, on the assumption that her readers were largely male (and sexist). Norton was born on Feb. 17, 1912, in Cleveland, Ohio, and spent a couple of decades as children's librarian in the Cleveland Public Library. Her abiding love of books also manifested in a teaching major at college, the buying of a bookstore, employment as a reader for a publishing house, and the founding of a research facility for "genre writers" (the High Hallack Library in Tennessee). But Norton's real calling was as an author. Although I'm not on the same page as my SF/F friends & neighbors, I may give Andre Norton a try one of these days. She was greatly admired by her legions of fans and was the recipient of two prestigious literary awards. Besides, anyone who loves books well enough to teach them, lend them, read them, sell them, and enable them (not to mention write over 300 [!] of them) sounds like somebody I would love too. There were five cases of today's typo in OhioLINK this morning. Check to make sure that it's Noton any of your library records.

(Voodoo Planet by Andrew North, from Project Gutenberg and Wikimedia Commons.)

Carol Reid

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