FALL 2008 SEASON
LIVE from the NYPL
LIVE is Ripe, Rigorous
Real Debates & Performance
LIVE is Salty Conversations
LIVE is Cognitive Theater
Fifth Avenue & 42nd Street
New York NY
Tickets on sale NOW!
WWW.NYPL.ORG/LIVE
Tuesday, September 16
BERNARD-HENRI LÉVY & SLAVOJ ŽIŽEK: A debate instigated by Paul Holdengräber
Violence & the Left in Dark Times
Bernard-Henri Lévy, France’s “rock-star philosopher” and author of Left in Dark Times: A Stand Against New Barbarism and Slavoj Zizek, the Slovanian”Elvis of cultural theory” and author of Violence: Six Sideways Reflections, will scrutinize the totalitarianisms of the past as well as those of the future, as they argue for a new political and moral vision for our times and investigate the limits of tolerance.
Celeste Bartos Forum
Wednesday, September 17
DANIEL MENDELSOHN & JAMES WOOD in conversation with PICO IYER
Reading in a World of Images
“Does the common reader exist in our world of splitting screens? Where might we find beauty, seriousness or moral passion among our fraying books? And does it even make sense to put Flaubert, Homer, and Oliver Stone into the same sentence? Two of the defining public critics of our time—James Wood, a passionate reader who creates cathedrals out of words, and Daniel Mendelsohn, a professional classicist bringing rigor to the popular arts—investigate the space where reading ends and real criticism begins.” Pico Iyer
South Court Auditorium
Friday, September 19
ROBERT BADINTER in conversation with NEAL KATYAL
Abolition of Capital Punishment
Robert Badinter, the French Minister of Justice from 1981-86, led the battle to abolish the death penalty in France. Badinter’s book, Abolition: One Man’s Battle Against the Death Penalty, serves as a guidebook on legal and political strategies n the quest for abolition. Badinter co-authored a book on the role of judges with U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer. Neal Katyal recently won Hamdan v. Rumsfeld in the U.S. Supreme Court, a case that challenged the policy of military trials at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Celeste Bartos Forum
Tuesday, September 23
ANTÓNIO LOBO ANTUNES in conversation with Paul Holdengräber
What Can I Do When Everything’s On Fire?
The preeminent Portuguese novelist, trained as a psychiatrist who spent four year in the Portuguese army during the Angolan War, tells a story in What Can I do When Everything Is On Fire? of sanity lost, of madness and consumption. This is a saga of growing old, of loving no matter what, and finally of a young man ineluctably coming to terms with the sins of his father and the life he has inherited now.
South Court Auditorium
Wednesday, September 24
PAUL AUSTER & CÉLINE CURIOL
Man in the Dark & Voice Over
In Céline Curiol’s Voice Over, a lonely young woman works as an announcer in Paris’s Gare du Nord, surrounded by people yet separate from them. In her solitude, she wanders the streets of the modern city, playing on the edge of danger, seeking connection. “I am alone in the dark, turning the world around in my head as I struggle through another bout of insomnia, another white night in the great American Wilderness.” So begins Paul Auster’s Man in Dark.
Celeste Bartos Forum
Friday, September 26
SPIKE LEE in conversation
Miracle at St. Anna
Spike Lee’s new film, Miracle at St. Anna, chronicles the story of four black American soldiers who are members of the US Army as part of the all African-American 92nd “Buffalo Soldier” Division stationed in Tuscany, Italy during World War II. Based on the novel and with screenplay by James McBride, it is a story about redemption and triumph over the bleakest of experiences.
Celeste Bartos Forum
Friday, October 10
FERRAN ADRIÀ
A Day at elBulli
Ferran Adria, “the Salvador Dali of the Kitchen,” has won global acclaim as one of the most creative and inventive culinary geniuses in the world. His restaurant elBulli has 3-Michelin stars and was ranked # 1 for the past three years in a row by the S. Pellegrino World’s 50 Best Restaurant Awards. Each year elBulli receives 2 million requests for only 8000 seats.
Celeste Bartos Forum
Wednesday, October 29
WIRED & LIVE present
GRANT ACHATZ & NATHAN MYHRVOLD moderated by MARK MCCLUSKY
The Cutting Edge: Tales from the Culinary Frontier
James Beard-award winning chef Grant Achatz, owner of Chicago’s Alinea restaurant, and sous vide guru Nathan Myhrvold, CEO of Intellectual Ventures and former CTO of Microsoft, will explore the ways that science and technology are transforming our notions of food with moderator Mark McClusky, senior editor at Wired.
South Court Auditorium
Thursday, October 30
AN EVENING WITH DRACULA
Beware of The New Annotated Dracula! After his New Annotated Sherlock Holmes, Leslie S. Klinger returns with a daring conceit: the Dracula tale is based on historical fact. Be prepared on the eve of Halloween to travel through the graveyards and the wilds of Transylvania as Klinger investigates the multifarious subtexts of the original narrative—from the masochistic to the necrophilic.
South Court Auditorium
Wednesday, November 5
NEW YORK CITY OPERA & LIVE present: “The Sound of Literature”
Co-presented with New York City Opera’s Opera Matters! Series, “The Sound of Literature” will explore the creative vistas on the remarkable intersection of words and music.
Celeste Bartos Forum
Monday, November 10
JOAN DIDION, ANDREW DELBANCO, DARRYL PINCKNEY, MICHAEL TOMASKY, GARRY WILLS & others. MODERATED BY ROBERT B. SILVERS
The Cullman Center for Scholars & Writers & LIVE present
What Happens Now? A conversation on the 2008 election
As the New York Review of Books turns 45, the evening will feature some of the publication’s most illustrious contributors including former Cullman Center Fellow and Melville scholar Andrew Delbanco, journalist, essayist, and novelist Joan Didion, writer Darryl Pinckney, journalist Michael Tomasky, historian Garry Wills, and others. Moderated by The New York Review of Books editor Robert B. Silvers.
Celeste Bartos Forum
Wednesday, November 12
TONI MORRISON in conversation
A Mercy
Nobel Prize recipient Toni Morrison‘s novel reveals what lies beneath the surface of slavery in an ambivalent, disturbing story of a mother abandoning her daughter in order to save her. Set in the 17th century when the slave trade was in its infancy, the book describes the religious persecution, racial hatred, and class distinction that allowed the institution of slavery to take root in the US.
Celeste Bartos Forum
Friday, December 5
ZADIE SMITH: On Sensibility
The Robert B. Silvers Lecture
Celeste Bartos Forum
Programs begin at 7 pm unless otherwise indicated
Made possible with generous support from Celeste Bartos and the Margaret and Herman Sokol Public Education Endowment Fund.
STAY TUNED! WWW.NYPL.ORG/LIVE
