Illinois Libraries Present: Jesmyn Ward – Virtual

Stay tuned for a registration link! We are joining libraries across the state of Illinois to host award-winning author, Jesmyn Ward. Ward will discuss how her literary vision and personal experiences address urgent questions about racism and social injustice. The event will be held virtually on Wednesday, October 12 at 7 pm.

We are joining libraries across the state of Illinois to host award-winning author, Jesmyn Ward. Ward will discuss how her literary vision and personal experiences address urgent questions about racism and social injustice. The event will be held virtually on Wednesday, October 12 at 7 pm.

Hailed as “the new Toni Morrison” by the American Booksellers Association, MacArthur Genius and two-time National Book Award winner, Jesmyn Ward is the author of fiction, nonfiction, and memoir that The New York Times Book Review called “raw, beautiful, and dangerous.” In 2017 she became the first woman and first person of color to win the National Book Award twice – joining the ranks of William Faulkner, Saul Bellow, John Cheever, Philip Roth, and John Updike. Ward’s novels, primarily set on Mississippi’s Gulf Coast, are deeply informed by the trauma of Hurricane Katrina.

Salvage the Bones, winner of the 2011 National Book Award, is a troubling, but ultimately empowering tale of familial bonds set amid the chaos of the hurricane. Men We Reaped :A Memoir, deals with the loss of five young men in her life – to drugs, accidents, suicide and the bad luck that follows people in poverty. Ward edited the critically acclaimed anthology The Fire This Time :A New Generation Speaks About Race, a New York Times bestseller. Her newest novel, the critically acclaimed Sing, Unburied, Sing, won the 2017 National Book Award. “A searing, urgent read for anyone who things the shadow of slavery and Jim Crow have passed” (Celeste Ng). Sing was nominated for the PEN/Faulkner Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the Aspen Words Literary Prize. Ward’s latest is Navigate Your Stars, an adaptation of her 2018 Tulane University Commencement speech that champions the value of hard work and the importance of respect for oneself and others.

A professor of creative writing at Tulane University and contributing editor to Vanity Fair, Ward’s many honors include the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction, a MacArthur Genius Grant, and a Strauss Living

An Evening with Jesmyn Ward is presented by Illinois Libraries Present, a new statewide collaboration among public libraries. The collaboration is designed to bring virtual events with bestselling, esteemed, and diverse speakers to library patrons across the state. 192 Illinois libraries have joined Illinois Libraries Present. Working together allows libraries to bring speakers to their communities that might not be possible due to budget constraints or production capabilities. Illinois Libraries Present is funded in part by a grant awarded by the Illinois State Library, a department of the Office of Secretary of State, using funds provided by the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services, under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA).

For more information, visit insert library website here or call insert library phone number here. For more information on this speaker please visit lyceumagency.com