Arts & Culture

Neil GiordanoAnita SilveyAnita Silvey, one of the nation’s leading experts on children’s literature, will speak on “100 Best Books for Children: Our Greatest Children’s Books and the Stories Behind Them,” for The Center for the Humanities in Arts & Sciences at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 9. The illustrated lecture stems from Silvey’s recent book, 100 Best Books for Children (2004), an in-depth survey of children’s literature from 1902 to 2002. In addition, Gerald Early, Ph.D., the Merle Kling Professor of Modern Letters and director of the Center for the Humanities, will discuss the center’s new Children’s Studies minor, which begins offering classes in spring 2006.

Diavolo will present two evening shows and also an all-ages matinee as part of the ovations! for young people series.

Matthew Coolidge, founder and director of the Center for Land Use Interpretation in Los Angeles, will be participating.

Courtesy photoBrenda Marie OsbeyBrenda Marie Osbey, Poet Laureate of the State of Louisiana, will host a fundraiser for victims of Hurricane Katrina currently staying in the St. Louis area from 4 to 6 p.m. Friday, Oct. 28, in The Gargoyle. Osbey, a native of New Orleans, will read from her work and discuss Katrina’s effects on the city. In addition, the event will feature Dixieland music by St. Louis’ Bourbon Street Band, while Gerald Early, Ph.D., the Merle Kling Professor of Modern Letters in Arts & Sciences, will speak on “The Death of Jazz and the Birth of New Orleans.”

Courtesy photoMichael MartoneAcclaimed fiction writer and essayist Michael Martone, the visiting Fannie Hurst Professor of Creative Literature in Washington University’s Writing Program in Arts & Sciences, will read from his work at 8 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 27. In addition, Martone will speak on coincidence and fate in fiction in a lecture entitled “Homer on Homer or a Bunch of Stuff That Happens” at 8 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 3.

The blistering yet exuberant depiction of modern urban life will kick off the OVATIONS! Series Oct. 21-22.

The report is by Peter MacKeith, associate director of the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts and associate dean of Architecture.

Forget purple mountains and fruited plains. The contemporary American landscape is more typically composed of parking lots and shopping malls, factory towns and industrial developments, argues Matthew Coolidge, founder and director of the Center for Land Use Interpretation in Los Angeles. From Oct. 26-29, Coolidge will host a number of events exploring St. Louis’ urban landscape as part of the yearlong series “Unsettled Ground: Nature, Landscape, and Ecology Now!” co-sponsored by the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts and the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts.

Courtesy photoDiavoloDiavolo — the acclaimed Los Angeles dance company known for combining bold movement with the adventurous, high-wire attitude of extreme sports — will bring its dynamic and wittily subversive choreography to Edison Theatre at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Oct. 28 and 29. In addition, Diavolo will present an all-ages matinee as part of the ovations! for young people series at 11 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 29.

Literally translated as “evening of song,” Liederabend is a German term referring to a recital given by a singer and pianist.