October 9, 2003

Eggers, Crain, Weiss lectures are scheduled

Dave Eggers, the writer who burst onto the literary landscape with the publication of “A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius,” will speak about Mark Twain and Twain’s work at 7 p.m. Monday, Oct. 13.

Eggers — this year’s “Great Authors on Great Books” speaker — will deliver a lecture titled “Mark Twain’s Journals and A Tramp Abroad: Is This Man Funny or Just Dead?” Free and open to the public, it will take place in Room 107 of Harris Hall. A reception will follow.

The lecture is sponsored by Northwestern’s Program of American Studies. For further information, call Phyllis Siegel at (847) 491-3525.

A discussion at 4 p.m. with the director of the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) and top personnel at Nicaraguan, Chilean and Peruvian newspapers on Wednesday, Oct. 15, will kick off this season’s Crain Lectures Series.

The admission-free, public lectures bring newsmakers, news reporters and news analysts to campus to explore different perspectives on current events. Topics in the Medill School of Journalism’s popular lecture series will include recent Federal Communications Commission decisions on media ownership, science writing, and TV news contracts.

The October lecture schedule is below. All presentations will take place in the Medill School’s McCormick Tribune Center Forum.

Wednesday, Oct. 15, 4 p.m.: “Democracy and Freedom in Latin America” with Cristiana Chamorro Barrios, Nicaraguan journalist and “La Prensa” board member; Felipe Edwards, editor of Chile’s “El Mercurio;” Alejo Miro Quesada, director of Peru’s “El Comercio;” and Ricardo Trotti, director of the Inter American Press Association representing newspapers throughout the Americas.

Monday, Oct. 20, noon: “Television News Contracts: Why Are They Needed?” with CBS2 Chicago TV news anchor Derrick Blakley and former WLS-TV Chicago news anchor Diann Burns.

Monday, Oct. 27, 4 p.m.: “Is Science Writing Coming of Age?” with University of California Berkeley journalism professor Tim Ferris and Deborah Blum, author of “Monkey Wars” and editor of “A Field Guide for Science Writers.” Nobel Prize-winning physicist Leon Lederman will moderate.

For further information about the Crain Lectures, visit www.medill.northwestern.edu.

The relationship between the Nazi regime and Germany’s business and scientific communities will be the subject of the Theodore Z. Weiss Holocaust Educational Foundation Lecture at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 15.

The event, free and open to the public, will take place in Room 107 in Harris Hall. A reception will follow.

In “Confronting the Nazi Past,” University of California Berkeley Professor Gerald Feldman will compare Nazi involvement in Germany’s business community to its involvement in the scientific community.

The lecture is sponsored by the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. For more information, call (847) 491-7561.