SMU July Summer Book Series: Four Favorite Woman Authors
Each summer for 15 years, SMU's Vicki Hill has selected her favorite books, written by women, to discuss with audiences.
Grounded by a nonexistent travel budget?
Escape the Texas summer with a good book recommended by SMU’s Vicki Hill. Each summer for 15 years she has selected four of her favorite books written by women to discuss with the audience at Dedman College’s Godbey Lecture Series. This year’s series begins July 7.
"Reading is about exploration and living in someone else’s world," said Hill, who added that she is disappointed in herself if she doesn’t read two books a week. A former SMU English professor with a Ph.D. in English and American Studies from SUNY Buffalo and long-time director of the Altshuler Learning Enhancement Center, Hill spends the year looking for just the right books for the series.
"A keeper is a book I want to read a second time, a book that makes me think or one I would recommend to a friend," Hill said.
Hill discusses the books with the audience – many of whom return year after year - not as an English professor, but reader to reader. "This is not high falutin’ literary criticism or theory, we talk about the sheer delight of how the novel works."
Summer Book Series Facts:
What: "Fiction’s Fundamentals: Characters and Circumstance" - Dedman College’s Godbey Lecture Series
When: Lecture at 11 a.m., lunch at noon
July 7 – The Air We Breathe by Andrea Barrett
July 14 – The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean
July 21 – Nothing is Quite Forgotten in Brooklyn by Alice Mattison
July 28 – Run by Ann Patchett
Where: Maggiano’s Little Italy; 205 NorthPark Center
Cost: Lunch and 4-lecture series, $180 Godbey members, $260 nonmembers; Individual lecture and lunch, $45 members, $65 nonmembers
Contact information: 214-768-2532 or smu.edu/godbey
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