Last night a legion of lovely zinester librarians stopped through Toronto to share their love of zine collecting and preservation as well as some pieces from their own zines. The travelers on the Orderly Disorder: zinester librarians tour are driving a mobile zine library across the States (with this one stop in Canada, hosted by twelveohtwo zine distro) on their way from an American Library Association annual conference to the Zine Librarian (un)Conference in Milwaukee, while making stops to share their work with various cities.
John Stevens, a librarian from Melbourne’s State Library of Victoria, read a piece about his decision to wear skirts from a zine called Blue Floral Gusset which also touched on his feelings about people who question his choice. Stevens has been working at the State Library since 2007 where he works with the largest zine collection in Australia (some 8,000 items).
Barnard College’s zine librarian, Jenna Freedman read snippets from an issue of her zine Lower East Side Librarian such as an hilarious piece called “Cats Are Better Than Kids” (though she assured us she means no offence to parents or kids). On her blog of the same name, Freedman reviews zines and books she picks up in her travels and writes about her favourite Library of Congress subject headings.
Celia Perez is one of the non zine-specific librarians on the tour, but she has been making zines for 15 years, including her zine i dreamed i was assertive which she read from last night. Her pieces, like most of the pieces read last night, were very personal and focussed on a relationship that grew out of the library and eventually went sour and her reflection on the relationship of between her dad and the things he owned.
Zine Mobile creator and driver, Debbie Rasmussen, confessed she is not a traditional librarian, but she curated and catalogued the zine collection inside the Zine Mobile (pictured). She described and passed around a small sampling of her wares and though her zine library on wheels is making a few more stops on its way home, she offered to mail any zines attendees wanted to borrow once the tour is over and continue circulating via the postal service.
Also on the bill were locals Clara Bee Lavery and Sarah Mangle (who read a story she wrote in grade two about princesses and their unicorns that even had her in tears of laughter). You can watch the filmed event here.
There are a few more stops left on the trip. Visit the roving librarians tonight at Cass Cafe in Detroit (4620 Cass Ave.) at 10pm or catch them as they stop in Chicago at Quimby’s Bookstore (1854 W. North Ave.) on July 6th and in Milwaukee at The Tool Shed (2427 N. Murray Ave.) on July 7th.