Events

Visiting Writers: Louise Gluck

Louise Glück is one of America’s finest contemporary poets. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Glück is a former Poet Laureate of the United States and the author of a dozen widely acclaimed books. Stephen Dobyns, writing in the New York Times Book Review, said “no American poet writes better than Louise Glück, perhaps none can lead us so deeply into our own nature.” Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Hass has called her “one of the purest and most accomplished lyric poets now writing.”

Dinosaur Zoo Live

Pollak Theatre

TWO SHOWS: 10 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. Direct from Australia, Erth’s DINOSAUR ZOO Live™ brings an awesome array of prehistoric creatures to life on stage. From cute baby dinos to teeth-gnashing giants, your family will observe and interact with extraordinary, life-like creatures in this highly imaginative, entertaining and educational live show.

$25 (adults); $15 (children)

National Theatre of London: King Lear

Pollak Theatre

Academy Award® winner Sam Mendes (Skyfall, American Beauty) returns to the National Theatre to direct Simon Russell Beale (Timon of Athens, Collaborators) in the title role of Shakespeare’s tragedy.

An aged king decides to divide his kingdom between his three daughters, according to which of them is most eloquent in praising him. His favourite, Cordelia, says nothing. Lear’s world descends into chaos.

$22

National Theatre Live: A Small Family Business

Pollak Theatre

A riotous exposure of entrepreneurial greed by Olivier Award-winning playwright Alan Ayckbourn (Bedroom Farce, A Chorus of Disapproval). A Small Family Business returns to the National Theatre for the first time since its celebrated premiere in 1987, when it won the Evening Standard Award for Best Play.

22

Gallery Exhibition: MAVIS SMITH / THINK AGAIN

Joan and Robert Rechnitz Hall

Imagining the hidden realities of other people’s existences is a continuing theme in the work of Bucks County artist Mavis Smith. Smith, who’s works are often done in egg tempera, brings an almost surreal aesthetic to her paintings that further suggests the dislocation of appearances and realities. This exhibition samples a range of Smith’s work from years past, as well as several new pieces, including both paintings and works on paper as well as some recent sculptural works incorporating egg shells. Opening Reception: Fri. September 19, from 7 – 9 pm

Gallery Exhibition: David H. Wells

Rotary Ice House Gallery

This exhibit examines the empty homes and foreclosed dreams littering the American landscape in the wake of the foreclosure crisis. After a house is foreclosed upon there is a fleeting moment when the ghosts of the one-time owners are all that is left – before the houses are cleaned and returned to the real estate market. The photographs in this exhibit capture the remaining signs of life that once filled these emptied houses bringing to light ideas about home, family and the American Dream. Opening Reception: Thursday, September 25, from 4:30 – 7pm

Visiting Writer: Melissa Febos

The Great Hall Auditorium

Melissa Febos is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir, Whip Smart, whose “electrifying prose and unremitting honesty” Kirkus Reviews said, “expertly captures grace within depravity.” Among other places, she has been featured on NPR’s Fresh Air with Terry Gross, Anderson Cooper Live, CNN, The Atlantic and Tin House online, Guernica, and New York magazine.  Her writing has been published and anthologized widely including in Glamour, Kenyon Review, Post Road, Hunger Mountain, Salon, Dissent, The Brooklyn Rail, New York Times, and the Chronicle of Higher Education Review.  She has taught writing at Purchase College, The New School, NYU, Sarah Lawrence, Utica College, and the Institute of American Indian Arts, among other places, and is currently Assistant Professor of Creative Nonfiction at Monmouth University.