A weblog following developments around the world in FRBR: Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records.

Maintained by William Denton, Web Librarian at York University. Suggestions and comments welcome at wtd@pobox.com.


Confused? Try What Is FRBR? (2.8 MB PDF) by Barbara Tillett, or Jenn Riley's introduction. For more, see the basic reading list.

Books: FRBR: A Guide for the Perplexed by Robert Maxwell (ISBN 9780838909508) and Understanding FRBR: What It Is and How It Will Affect Our Retrieval Tools edited by Arlene Taylor (ISBN 9781591585091) (read my chapter FRBR and the History of Cataloging).

Calendar

March 2006
M T W T F S S
« Feb   Apr »
 12345
6789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
2728293031  

1 March 2006

2006 FRBR Challenge: FRBR vs. Middle-Earth!

Filed under: 2006 FRBR Challenge — William Denton @ 7:30 am

Today is the start of the first contest here at the FRBR Blog: the 2006 FRBR Challenge. The challenge is: How well does FRBR handle Middle-Earth?

People are using FRBR, some on a small scale, some on a large scale, some by automating the extraction and matching of works from a set of manifestations, some by having people do the work manually, most by a mix of both. They’re all showing that FRBR works and that it helps users. They’re also turning up some problems, points that need clarification, grey areas, and places where the model falls a bit short and needs something added. That’s to be expected.

Applying FRBR to J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-Earth (The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and everything else) will test the model and give us some ideas about what’s easy to do and what’s hard to do, what’s clearly explained in FRBR and what needs more detail, what FRBR already handles and where it’s lacking, and how to deal with really complicated situations involving digital copies or multiple works in one work. I really do mean everything else: movies, Sindarin dictionaries, the whole megillah.

The Rules

So here’s what to do: think of something LOTR-related, and, as best you can, describe it as a work, expression, manifestation, and item, and, if you can, explain a relationship it has to a book Tolkien wrote or something inspired by Tolkien’s work. That’s all. Use official FRBR terminology if you want, but you don’t have to. If you can’t think of what the expression is, or the work, just say so and maybe someone else will have a stab at it.

The challenge closes in two weeks, at the end of Wednesday 15 March 2006.

Prizes

Anyone who enters is eligible for a prize. First prize is a Nancy Pearl Librarian Action Figure and a copy of Out On the Rim, by Ross Thomas (40 KB PDF). Second prize is a copy of Gone, No Forwarding by Joe Gores. Both the first- and second-prize winners also get one of these S.R. Ranganathan buttons, and third prize is just a button. I’ll pick at random from everyone who suggests something.

How to Enter

Add a comment to this post, or any post until the contest closes. When you submit a comment it won’t show up right away, because I need to approve them by hand (to prevent spammers from clogging things up). I’ll approve it as soon as I can. You can also e-mail me your entry, and I’ll post it.

Examples

Here’s an example:

  • Work: The Fellowship of the Ring.
  • Expression: I don’t know if this is Tolkien’s original text or the revised text (see Wikipedia for a brief explanation).
  • Manifestation: Unwin Paperback’s second edition (unknown reprinting) of 1966 (ISBN 004823155X).
  • Item: My copy, the one I’ve had since I first read the series in grade six.
  • Relationships? It’s part of The Lord of the Rings, of course.

Here’s another:

  • Work: The Complete Guide to Middle-Earth: From The Hobbit to The Silmarillion, by Robert Foster.
  • Epxression: Revised 1978 text.
  • Manifestation: First paperback edition, published by Del Rey (ISBN 0345279751).
  • Item: My copy.
  • Relationships? This is a detailed index to The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion, explaining all the characters and places and events and listing where they occur in the texts. It cites two different editions of The Hobbit, other Tolkien works, and some secondary sources.

Here’s a third, somewhat less thorough:

  • Work: A clip-on costume Gandalf beard.
  • Expression: I have no idea at all.
  • Manifestation: I don’t remember any details; I just saw it in a store once and didn’t write down the details.
  • Item: The one I saw in the store.
  • Relationships? Well, it’s inspired by the books or the movies. The precise term for the relationship between a book and a clip-on beard escapes me.

Things to Consider

My Unwin paperback of The Fellowship of the Ring isn’t too hard to describe using FRBR. The bibliographic universe of Peter Jackson’s movie adaptations will probably be very difficult: think of all the different releases and the DVD versions with lots of extras and documentaries and commentary tracks, all packaged differently, in different languages, all over the world. Other things to ponder:

  • Is The Lord of the Rings a work made up of three smaller works? What about the appendices at the end of Return of the King — is each a work of its own? How many works are contained in a one-volume edition of LOTR? I believe Tolkien considered it all one novel.
  • The Silmarillion and all those other books edited by Christopher Tolkien. That’s a complicated publishing history.
  • The Lord of the Rings, the musical, opening in Toronto later this month
  • The Ralph Bakshi movie.
  • Rush’s Rivendell, Led Zeppelin’s The Battle of Evermore, and hundreds of other works of music inspired by LOTR, including a lot of progressive rock and heavy metal.
  • The Very Secret Diary of Boromir of Gondor at LiveJournal.
  • Translations.

Background Reading and Sources of Ideas

Reference

Let the challenge begin! Leave your entry in a comment.