Arts & Sciences

Seth Carlin, professor of music and director of the piano programRenowned pianist Seth Carlin, professor of music and director of the piano program in Arts & Sciences, will perform music of Johann Sebastian Bach, Maurice Ravel and Robert Schumann at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, March 28, in Washington University’s Edison Theatre.

The Washington University Chamber Winds will present a free concert at 8 p.m. Tuesday, March 30, in Holmes Lounge.

Do images of the injured and dead have any effect on its viewers? Do images of suffering and violence generate compassion, arouse hunger for revenge, or do nothing? These are the questions writer and cultural critc Susan Sontag tries to answer in her most recent collection of essays, Regarding the Pain of Others, and will share her thoughts with the audience at the next Assembly Series lecture.

PakeGeorge E. Pake, Ph.D., recipient of the National Medal of Science, professor of physics at Washington University in St. Louis, Washington University provost from 1962-1970, and emeritus trustee, died of heart failure Thursday, March 4, 2004, in Tucson, Ariz. He was 79.

W. Ralph Johnson, a distinguished professor emeritus of classics and comparative studies at the University of Chicago, will be the John and Penelope Biggs lecturer in the classics. Johnson’s writings present refreshing interpretations of classical texts, and reveal new insights into ancient writers and the value of their work to contemporary society.

David Kilper / WUSTL PhotoTracey Kaplan as Madeline and Brian Golden as Stamp in the world premiere of *Kid Peculiar at the Coral Court Motel* by Carter W. Lewis.October 1992. St. Louis and the nation await the Clinton-Bush-Perot presidential debate at Washington University. An estranged mother and son reunite for perhaps the last time at a fading St. Louis icon. The stage is set for Kid Peculiar at the Coral Court Motel, by playwright-in-residence Carter W. Lewis. The St. Louis-based tragi-comedy — commissioned as part of the university’s 150th anniversary celebration — will make its world premiere in the A.E. Hotchner Studio Theatre March 25-28.

Scott Levin and Adam Cromer in the Washington University Opera’s production *Of Mice and Men*.The Washington University Opera will present Carlisle Floyd’s Of Mice and Men, based on John Steinbeck’s 1937 novella, at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, March 19 and 20.

Ann Nguyen chose a risky project for her graduate studies at Washington University in St. Louis. A university team had already sifted through 100,000 grains from a meteorite to look for a particular type of stardust — without success. In 2000, Nguyen decided to try again. About 59,000 grains later, her gutsy decision paid off. In the March 5 issue of Science, Nguyen and her advisor, Ernst K. Zinner, Ph.D., research professor of physics and of earth and planetary sciences, both in Arts & Sciences, describe nine specks of silicate stardust — presolar silicate grains — from one of the most primitive meteorites known.

Washington University’s Department of Music in Arts & Sciences and the St. Louis Chapter of the American Guild of Organists will present a concert and symposium highlighting the works of French composer Alexandre Guilmant (1837-1911) March 19 and 20. The concert commemorates the immense organ of 10,000 pipes built for Festival Hall, the primary concert venue of the 1904 World’s Fair.

South African fortepianist Kristian Bezuidenhout, winner of the Westfield Center for keyboard studies’ prestigious Young Scholar’s Award, will present a fortepiano recital in Washington University’s Karl Umrath Hall Lounge at 8 p.m. Monday, March 15.