2011-2012 Rosamond Gifford Lecture Series
The Rosamond Gifford Lecture Series is now the largest library-related lecture series in the country. We will be celebrating our 16th season this year. Our lectures have enriched the Central New York community by presenting some of the best literary talent of our time to entertain, delight and inform our audience.
The success of our series has allowed the Friends of the Central Library [FOCL] to contribute over a quarter of a million dollars to the Onondaga County Central Library to purchase new books and materials, and to support their adult and children’s programming.
Past seasons have featured a variety of talented writers, including Pulitzer and Nobel prize winners.
FOCL Office Hours
Tuesday – Thursday
9:00 AM to 5:00 PM
E-mail and Voicemail are checked regularly
Contact FOCL
Friends of the Central Library
The Galleries of Syracuse
447 South Salina St.
5th Floor
Syracuse, NY 13202
315-435-1832
FOCL@onlib.org
giffordlectureseries.org
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Ticket Information
To purchase tickets for the Rosamond Gifford Lecture Series contact the OnCenter Box Office at 315-435-2121. Individual tickets for the 2011-2012 season will go on sale after Labor Day 2011. Contact the FOCL office if you have questions regarding season tickets.
2011-2012 Authors
Jonathan Franzen - Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Jonathan Franzen Page at Macmillan
Jonathan Franzen was born in Western Springs, Illinois, in 1959. He grew up in Webster Groves, Missouri, a suburb of St. Louis. After graduating from Swarthmore College in 1981 he studied in Berlin as a Fulbright scholar. Franzen is the author of a bestselling collection of essays, How to Be Alone and the memoir The Discomfort Zone. He is well-known for his books The Corrections and (most recently) Freedom. His short stories and his essays, including political journalism, have most recently appeared in The New Yorker, The Best American Essays, The New York Times, and The Guardian. In 2009 The Corrections was named as one of the “100 Best Books of the Decade” by The Times (London). In August 2010, Franzen was featured on the cover of TIME Magazine - only the second time a living writer has been on the cover of this national magazine.
Read more ...
Dennis Lehane - Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Dennis Lehane Official Website
Interview at The Guardian.co.uk
Biography and interview at bookreporter.com
Dennis Lehane was born and raised in Dorchester, Massachusetts. Before becoming a full-time writer, he worked as a counselor with mentally handicapped and abused children, waited tables, parked cars, drove limos, worked in bookstores, and loaded tractor-trailers. Lehane’s works include the New York Times best-sellers Moonlight Mile, The Given Day, Gone Baby Gone, Mystic River, and Shutter Island. Mystic River was a finalist for the 2001 PEN/Winship Award and won both the Anthony Award and the Barry Award for Best Novel, the Dilys Award from the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association and the Massachusetts Book Award in Fiction from the Massachusetts Center for the Book. In addition, three of Lehane’s books have been made into hit movies: Shutter Island, Gone Baby Gone, and Mystic River.
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Alexandra Fuller - Monday, December 5, 2011
Alexandra Fuller Official Website
Interview at Random House's Bold Type
Read or Listen to an Excerpt on NPR
Alexandra Fuller was born in Glossop, England in 1969, during a brief attempt by her parents to live outside of Africa. The family moved back to Africa in 1972, and Fuller was educated in Zimbabwe until she was eighteen. Her debut book, Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood, was a New York Times Notable Book for 2002, the 2002 Booksense Best Non-fiction book, a finalist for the Guardian’s First Book Award and the winner of the 2002 Winifred Holtby Memorial Prize. Her 2004 Scribbling the Cat: Travels with an African Soldier won the Ulysses Prize for Art of Reportage. Her latest book is The Legend of Colton H. Bryant. She has also written extensively for magazines and newspapers including The New Yorker and National Geographic magazine. Fuller is currently at work on a book titled Cocktail Hour Under the Tree of Forgetfulness, a prequel/sequel to Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight.
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Sherman Alexie - Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Sherman Alexie Official Website
Sherman Alexie, a Spokane/Coeur d'Alene Indian, grew up on the Spokane Indian Reservation in Wellpinit, WA, about 50 miles northwest of Spokane. Alexie underwent a brain operation at the age of 6 months and was not expected to survive. Beating the odds against him, he lived, but suffered seizures throughout his childhood. Alexie learned to read by age three, and devoured novels by age five. His first novel, Reservation Blues, won Booklist’s Editors Choice Award for Fiction. His latest books include Flight, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, a 2007 National Book Award winner in Young People’s Literature, and Face, his first full collection of poems in nine years. Alexie wrote and produced the film, Smoke Signals, based on his book, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven, which won the Audience Award and Filmmakers Trophy at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival. He is currently working on a sequel to The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven entitled, Fire with Fire, and a sequel to True Diary entitled, The Magic and Tragic Year of My Broken Thumb.
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Laurie R. King - Monday, April 2, 2012
Laurie R. King Official Website
Biography and interview at bookreporter.com
Laurie R. King is a third generation Northern Californian living near Monterey Bay. King’s academic background includes a BA in Comparative Religion from UC Santa Cruz, a MA in Old Testament Theology from Berkeley’s Graduate Theological Union, and an honorary doctorate, also from the GTU. King’s first novel, A Grave Talent won the First Novel Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America and the Creasey Dagger from Britain’s Crime Writers’ Association. The Beekeeper’s Apprentice was chosen as one of the century’s best crime novels by the IMBA and her books appear regularly on bestseller lists that include the Independent Booksellers Associations and the New York Times. In 2010, she was inducted into the Baker Street Irregulars, and was appointed Guest of Honor at the annual mystery convention, BoucherCon. She continues to write in two series and standalone novels.
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Abraham Verghese - Monday, May 7, 2012
Abraham Verghese Official Website
Abraham Verghese, whose parents were teachers in Ethiopia, grew up near Addis Ababa and began his medical training there. He came to the United States to complete a residency in internal medicine and worked as a fellow in infectious diseases. While working at Boston City Hospital, he first saw the early signs of the HIV epidemic. He is best known for caring for numerous AIDS patients in an era when little could be done. Verghese was the founding director of the Center for Medical Humanities and Ethics at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center, San Antonio. He earned an MFA in 1990-91. His first book, My Own Country, about AIDS in rural Tennessee, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for 1994 and was made into a movie by Mira Nair. His second book, The Tennis Partner, was a New York Times notable book and a national bestseller. His third book, Cutting for Stone, has been published by Knopf.
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Ticket Information
To purchase tickets for the Rosamond Gifford Lecture Series contact the OnCenter Box Office at 315-435-2121. Individual tickets for the 2011-2012 season will go on sale after Labor Day 2011. Contact the FOCL office if you have questions regarding season tickets.
The Oncenter Box Office is located in the War Memorial.
You may also call the Oncenter Box Office at 315-435-2121.
Lectures are held in the John H. Mulroy Civic Center, 441 Montgomery Street, Syracuse, New York.
All lectures begin at 7:30 PM.
For information on how to become a sponsor of the Rosamond Gifford Lecture Series, please contact
our FOCL office at 315-435-1832.
Proceeds of the Rosamond Gifford Lecture Series will be used by Friends of the Central Library for new book and material acquisitions as well as children's programming at the Central Library and city branches.
Last updated: June 7, 2011