About nine students got an anime break at the Grand Island Public Library Tuesday afternoon, which was almost the halfway point in the holiday break from school for students in the Grand Island area. Anime is popular with students year-round, according to Celine Stahlnecker, youth librarian for the Grand Island Public Library, which regularly shows anime features while simultaneously giving young people an opportunity to make a craft.
Librarian Jackie Tran said crafts are run simultaneously with the film because the event for teens is only scheduled to run for two hours, which makes it impossible to watch a film and then complete a craft.Actually, young people who go to the library to watch an anime feature also enjoy a third activity: Eating ramen noodles prepared by Tran. On Tuesday, Tran prepared buttered chicken ramen noodles.
Strictly speaking, Tuesday’s feature was not anime. It was a live action film based on an anime television series. That did not bother any of the students who went to the library — even John Wagoner, a junior at Grand Island Senior High, who said one of the reasons that he enjoys anime is seeing the different styles of art used to draw the animated stories. That perhaps should not be surprising because Wagoner said he does “a lot of drawing” on his own time
Wagoner said some anime artists draw the nose as just a shadow. Others draw their characters with faces that are nothing but angles. He said still other artists draw their characters with round faces.
Regardless of how much he enjoys anime, there was one other reason why Wagoner wanted to come to the library on Tuesday: The film and craft activity provided a good reason to “get out of the house.”
Although Wagoner likes seeing all the styles used in anime, he also enjoys the stories themselves.
Jaime Shaw, 15, a sophomore at Grand Island Senior High, said she enjoys anime because the art form features so many story lines and so many genres including action, adventure, comedy and romance. Shaw noted that anime covers the full gamut of subject matter as television shows and movies.
“Some are funny and some are really serious,” she said. “I saw one that was based on Romeo and Juliet, but which had more science fiction to it.”
Much, but not all, anime is created in Japan and many animated features are influenced by Japanese and Asian artistic styles, no matter which country they originate from.
Shaw said she gets to see some anime via the Internet. Often times, a website will allow a person to see a portion of anime, then make a decision about buying it online. Shaw said she buys a fair amount of anime from Hastings Books, Music and Videos store. She agreed with the proposition that having the library regularly show anime helps stretch her anime entertainment dollar a little farther.
Stahlnecker said the Grand Island Public Library has a great graphic novel section, which she described as being the print version of anime. She said graphic novels appeal to people of all ages, including some of the library’s youngest patrons, through teens and all the way through adults.
Stahlnecker said graphic novels also seem to appeal to people of greatly varying reading ability, going from people who might struggle to read a text-heavy book to people who are excellent readers, but simply enjoy the graphic novel format.