culture

Disneyland is revamping the "It's a Small World" ride to accommodate today's fatter passengers on its boats and, more controversially, to include Disney characters among the anonymous dancing dolls.

The family of the ride's designer, Mary Blair, recently joined fans in protest, sending a letter to the company denouncing the "gross desecration of the ride's original theme."

That theme was common in 1964, when the ride debuted at the New York World's Fair: "an innocent and unified world at peace," depicted by a cast neatly divided by skin color and national costume. Walt Disney guided TV viewers past Dutch children in wooden shoes, an Ireland of shamrocks and leprechauns, "the mysterious dark continent of Africa," and "exotic Asia," the land of minor chords and veiled dancers, flying carpets and the Taj Mahal. Like the Miss Universe pageant's opening ceremony and the International House of Pancakes, "Small World" portrays a happy, colorful internationalism. But, like the Star Trek universe, where intraspecies mating is more common than interracial marriage, it also assumes segregation and stasis. MORE

The New York Public Library announced a $1-billion renovation plan that aims to quadruple attendance at the flagship main branch by 2014.

For a building guarded by marble lions, projecting an air of welcome is not easy. That is why library president Paul LeClerc, who proudly spearheaded the successful new Bronx Library Center, wants to bring a cafe, information center, and lending capacity to the austere Manhattan branch. "This plan," an official told the New York Times, "is the further democratization of that building." MORE