Newberry Library

Sponsored by Nextbook.org. Tickets are $8 ($6 students/under 25), at the Nextbook site.

Time: Tuesday, April 8, 2008 6:00 p.m.
Location: Newberry Library, 60 W. Walton Street, Chicago, IL 60610

Liberty of Conscience, the latest work from respected philosopher Martha Nussbaum, argues that America's tradition of religious freedom is predicated on equal respect for all citizens and their ... (more)beliefs. This ideal, however, is seriously threatened by groups on both side of the religious spectrum who seek, on the one hand, to emphasize one religious understanding at the cost of other belief systems or, on the other, curtail religious influence altogether. It is Nussbaum's contention that these efforts, partisan by their very nature, undermine the value of religious freedom and directly violate the Constitution.

Martha Nussbaum is currently Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago, a chair that includes appointments in the Philosophy Department, the Law School, and the Divinity School. She also holds Associate appointments in Classics and Political Science, is a member of the Committee on Southern Asian Studies, and a Board Member of the Human Rights Program. Nussbaum is the author of numerous books, including Cultivating Humanity, Animal Rights, and The Clash Within.

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Edward Price Bell (1869–1943) invented the job of foreign correspondent when he opened the London bureau of the Chicago Daily News in 1900. The autobiography of this once widely-known and highly respected foreign correspondent lay unpublished in the Newberry Library until John Maxwell Hamilton and ... (more)Jaci Cole edited and published it as part of a series of memoirs and books by pioneering foreign correspondents. Following remarks on Bell, Hamilton will join Richard C. Longworth, prize-winning Chicago Tribune foreign correspondent for 20 years, for a conversation about how the roles and responsibilities of the foreign correspondent have changed from Bell’s time to ours and what, if anything, has remained the same.

Admission is $9 ($6 for Newberry Library Associates who are at the Author level or above, having donated $100 or more to the Annual Fund) and includes wine, beer, and soft drinks. Doors open at 5:30 pm and programs begin at 6:15 pm.

Does faith have a role in environmentalism? Will climate change transform the way we think about God? Is there a Biblical notion of stewardship? If so, do Jews and Christians interpret it in the same way? Join distinguished novelists and critics Marilynne Robinson and Jonathan Rosen for a conversation ... (more)about creation, Darwinism, and the reconciliation of science and religion.

Single Ticket Prices:
$8 per event
($6 Student/Under 25)

To purchase tickets: Tickets by web at Nextbook.org, click on "Public Programs".

"Often referred to as "landscape art under glass," Jens Jensen's revolutionary 1908 design of the Garfield Park Conservatory is a poetic interpretation of his beloved Midwestern landscape as he imaged it in prehistoric times. The Conservatory is at the center of a larger story: how nature, urban design, ... (more)and horticulture helped to shape one of Chicago's most interesting neighborhoods. The co-authors are the historian of the Chicago Park District and the consulting landscape historian and director of the Jens Jensen Legacy Project. Their centennial history covers everything from the history of the conservatory and Garfield Park to the revival of the surrounding community."

"Historian Sally A. Kitt Chappell sees Chicago in the forefront of global efforts to end the divide between town and country by bringing into harmony buildings and landscapes, culture and nature, commerce and leisure. In Chicago's Urban Nature, she provides new insights into such historic Chicago sites ... (more)as Jens Jensen's Garfield Park Conservatory and Frederick Law Olmsted's Jackson Park. Then she takes us to innovative contemporary green spaces they influenced, from City Hall's rooftop garden to the North Lawndale Green Youth Farm and the new Millennium Park. The sixty-six beautiful spaces described in the guidebook meld art, architecture, and ecology. Far more than retreats - they're now essential parts of the cultural life of the modern city."

(NOTE: Tickets $5.00 EA / FREE for Educators & Students) DESCRIPTION:In this era of cultural globalization, artists everywhere must rethink, reframe, and even translate what it means to be human. Drawing on examples that range from the Internet to the earthquake in China’s Sichuan Province, a panel ... (more)of distinguished authors-in-residence at the International Writing Program (IWP) at the University of Iowa will share their visions for a robust cosmopolitan future where culture thrives, the parameters of citizenship expand, and the highest values are acknowledged as universal.

Poet, nonfiction writer, and IWP director Christopher Merrill leads the discussion.

(NOTE: Tickets $5.00 EA / FREE for Educators & Students) DESCRIPTION: Complementing the Newberry Library’s major fall exhibition Artifacts of Childhood: 700 Years of Children’s Books at the Newberry Library, the Festival welcomes two distinguished observers of American children’s literature. Marcus, ... (more)arguably the field’s leading historian and critic, will discuss Minders of Make-Believe, his sweeping new history of the visionaries who created and shaped the children’s book industry in the United States. Niffenegger, the celebrated author and illustrator of The Three Incestuous Sisters and The Adventuress and a professor at Columbia College Chicago’s Center for Book and Paper Arts, will offer a more personal view as she considers the magical world of Little Golden Books and their value to her own, more adult-oriented work. Chicago book critic Donna Seaman will moderate.

(NOTE: Tickets $5.00 EA / FREE for Educators & Students) DESCRIPTION: Shakespeare’s Macbeth is a tragedy of ambition, a quality valued in today’s society. Indeed, the play’s universality hinges on the ease with which we are able to identify with the “noble” Macbeth and his wife, whose shared ... (more)determination eventually fuels their intent to murder the king to seize his crown (Thinking Big, indeed). But to desire such an end is a far cry from being able to enact the means to achieve it. Stern, on the faculty of the
Institute for Psychoanalysis and in the humanities and psychiatry at the University of Chicago, will consider the varied and conflicted psychological motives that, for Macbeth and his Lady, make the difference.