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Classic: adj. Serving as a standard of excellence: of recognized value <classic literary works> (Source: Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. Accessed: December 17, 2013.)
Librarians are supposed to know what classics are. They are the books that one must have in the collection, the books that are checked out continually, regardless of how old they are. They are the titles that are frequently replaced, or need rebinding, because they have become “shelfworn” from heavy use. They are published before one’s lifetime…right?
Wrong. Since receiving my library degree in 1997, and throughout my time working at Mechanics’, many “modern classics”—titles that match all the above criteria—have been written. Using an arbitrary date range of 1997-2008, I came up with a few titles that have trickled into the mainstream consciousness, regardless of subject area.
Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, by Jared Diamond (573.2 D53g)
The thesis behind Diamond’s work is thus: why do some civilizations rise, while others fall? How do empires come about? How do they crumble? His accessible work, written in 1997, has become a mainstay of bibliographies for authors of all stripes, both fiction and nonfiction.
Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal, by Eric Schlosser (394.1 S345)
Until recently, grab-and-go hamburgers and hot dogs were unabashed staples of the American diet. In 2001 Schlosser made clear the health implications and lack of individuality that resulted from a culture of instant gratification and mass production, not only on our nation, but on the world.
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, by Barbara Ehrenreich (305.56 E33)
In the 1990s, journalist Ehrenreich went undercover to discover whether it was possible to make a living on minimum wage. She advertised herself as a woman just reentering the workforce after years of motherhood, and left each job when she ran out of money. Her conclusions, published in 2001, came as a surprise to many who had never tried to support themselves at menial jobs.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, by Stieg Larsson (Fiction)
Larsson’s convoluted 2005 crime novel, featuring a mentally unstable antihero named Liz Salander, threw open the door left unlocked by Henning Mankell and ushered in a crowd of Scandinavian crime authors to a voracious English-language market. If Larsson hadn’t died intestate, however, it’s debatable whether his novel would have crossed genre boundaries, let alone international ones.
