Daniel Handler creates Lemony Snicket Prize for librarians
Handler's award, known as the Lemony Snicket Prize for Noble Librarians Faced With Adversity, was recently given out for the first time to New Orleans librarian Laurence Copel.
A cluster of new homes sits near the levee in the Lower 9th Ward in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Ann Hermes
Author Daniel Handler has created an award for librarians, which was recently given out for the first time and went to a librarian from New Orleans.
Handler, also known as 鈥淎 Series of Unfortunate Events鈥� writer Lemony Snicket, recently awarded the Lemony Snicket Prize for Noble Librarians Faced With Adversity to librarian Laurence Copel. Winners of Handler鈥檚 prize receive $3,000, in addition to $1,000 for travel expenses (Copel鈥檚 prize is being officially given to her at the American Library Association Annual Conference & Exhibition in Las Vegas), a certificate, and a "strange item" from Handler.
The librarian who is honored receives the award for 鈥渇ac[ing] adversity with integrity and dignity intact,鈥� according to the .
According to the ALA, Copel is known to children around her neighborhood as 鈥渢he book lady.鈥� She created a library in her own home using her own funds and donations and used her bicycle to bring books to those who couldn鈥檛 get there.
Handler鈥檚 prize, which is co-administered by the Office for Intellectual Freedom and the ALA Governance Office, will be given annually.
Of the prize, Handler said in a statement, 鈥淚t is of the opinion of Lemony Snicket, author, reader, and alleged malcontent, that librarians have suffered enough鈥�. It is Mr. Snicket's hope, and the ALA's, that the Snicket聽Prize will remind readers everywhere of the joyous importance of librarians and the trouble that is all too frequently unleashed upon them.鈥�