December 12, 2012 In his most recent book, Mr g: A Novel About the Creation, Memphis native Alan Lightman takes on the ultimate questions of mind and spirit, writing a twenty-first-century creation story which features a God who works within the laws of physics. He answers questions from Chapter 16 about the genesis of the book, and he shares his thoughts on the troubling cultural rift between science and religion.
December 6, 2012 In a new biography of Thomas Jefferson, Jon Meacham considers not only Jefferson’s political career but also the ways he operated in both the political and intellectual spheres of the early American republic. In recent years, biographers have cast a more critical light on Jefferson’s career, often focusing on the disconnect between his intellectual ideals and his political behavior. While acknowledging that the third president was far from perfect, Meacham makes the case for seeing Jefferson as a pragmatist rather than a hypocrite. Meacham will discuss Thomas Jefferson at the Nashville Public Library on December 13 at 6:15 p.m. as part of the Salon@615 series. The event is free and open to the public.
November 30, 2012 In 1999, the Land Trust for Tennessee was chartered to “preserve the unique character of Tennessee’s natural and historic landscapes and sites for future generations.” So far, more than 200 landowners have partnered with the Land Trust to create conservation easements that now protect 75,000 acres in Tennessee—family farms, historic buildings, rural lands, even an arboretum. Home to Us, a lavish new coffee-table book by Varina Willse, with photos by Nancy Rhoda, features the stories of six very different families who have preserved their lands through conservation easements. Willse recently answered questions about the project from Chapter 16.
November 27, 2012 Author of seven books of poems, including a new and selected collection titled Horses Where the Answers Should Have Been), Chase Twichell applies her study of Buddhism to deliver well-chiseled, unsentimental poems that explore terrain not normally associated with Buddhist thought. Whether addressing hot-house irises, Dumpsters, or Chanel No. 5, her poems ponder questions that matter: what is the self, and why do we suffer? As a consequence, Twichell has been awarded many prestigious prizes, including the 2011 Kingsley and Kate Tufts Poetry Award, which carries a $100,000 stipend, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Artists Foundation, and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Chase Twichell will read from her work on November 29, in Vanderbilt’s Buttrick Hall, Room 101, at 7 p.m. The event is free and open to the public.
November 20, 2012 In 1999, the award-winning, bestselling novelist Barbara Kingsolver founded The Bellwether Prize, an award given biennially to an unpublished debut novel that addresses matters of social justice and responsibility. Carrying a $25,000 prize—funded entirely by Kingsolver herself—and a publishing contract, the Bellwether is “designed to be a career-founding event for writers with outstanding literary skills, moral passion, and the courage to combine these strengths in unusually powerful fiction,” as Kingsolver’s website puts it. Susannah Felts will interview Naomi Benaron and Hillary Jordan, two Bellwether winners, at Parnassus Books in Nashville on November 29 at 6:30 pm. The event is free and open to the public.
November 7, 2012 “Emigrants, immigrants, adventurers, and runaways—they fascinate me because they loiter on the margins, stripped of the markers of family and nation,” writes novelist Emma Donoghue in her new story collection, Astray. “Travelers know all the confusion of the human condition in concentrated form. Migration is mortality by another name, the itch we can’t scratch.” The bestselling author of Room will read from Astray at the Nashville Public Library at 6:15 p.m. on November 13 as part of the Salon@615 series.
