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1. Question: Wish list for a Spanish-language pathfinder

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Could your library use a good pathfinder in Spanish—that is, a concise guide to useful Spanish-language reference sources both on the shelves and on the web?  Something you could print out, fold twice, and distribute to patrons?  Let me know what you’d like to see in such a pathfinder; I’ll work it out and make it available at the website.

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2. The first SOL quiz!

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We often use the word ‘patron’ to refer to library users—what is the Spanish word that most closely resembles ‘patron’, exactly how is it pronounced, what does it mean, and what’s the message there for us?  Send us your answers!

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3.  Ortega y Gasset and the divine mania of love

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José Ortega y Gasset was a Spanish philosopher, and he was editor and publisher of a newspaper called, get this, El Sol.  A collection of essays from that well-named newspaper was published in 1939 under the title Studies on Love.  It’s not the most romantic stuff you’ll ever read, but here’s a taste of it with my wishes for a Happy Valentine’s Day.

“[Love] does not constitute enrichment of our mental life—just the opposite.  It grows rigid and fixed, prisoner to a single being.  Plato called it ‘divine mania.’  Nonetheless, the person enamored has the sense of life being much richer.  In the reduction of their world, it seemingly grows more concentrated.”

“The type of humanity we prefer in another being sketches the profile of our own soul.  Love is an impetus that emerges from the subterranean reaches of our person, and in traveling to the surface dredges the algae and shells of our interior with it.”