FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 10, 2003      File #
Contact: Jean Wasp, Media Relations, (707) 664-2057

Jack London Series Celebrates with Lectures, Fireside Tales

Leading authorities on Jack London will present a captivating series of public lectures and readings at Sonoma State University from June 25-August 13. The program this year offers readings of London's tales by celebrity guests during two free Fireside Tale programs, especially for families, in the campus Alumni Amphitheatre behind Evert B. Person theatre.

In honoring the 100th anniversary of the publication of London’s most popular story, The Call of the Wild, the eight-week lecture series at 7 p.m. on Wednesday evenings promises to awaken readers of all ages to the inspiration of the London legacy. All lectures will be held in the Evert B. Person Theatre. Fees for the lectures are $6 each. All six are $30.

The series examines the life and works of this dynamic American author from multiple perspectives — explorer, pioneer, writer, traveler, architect and naturalist. Discussion, reading and film topics center on London’s contribution to literacy and focus on his legacy and importance in today’s world.

The full schedule includes:

June 25 — Fireside Tales - Dramatic readings of excerpts from Jack London's The Call of the Wild. Free in Alumni Amphitheatre.

July 2 — Sara S. Hodson presents an illustrated talk on the Huntington Library's 50,000-item Jack London collection, focusing on the resources that richly document his Klondike tales as well as his own life in the rugged, unforgiving North in the lecture titled "The Call of the Files: Finding Jack London's Klondike in the Huntington Library"

July 9 — Donna Campbell examines London’s first unsuccessful Yukon novel, "A Daughter of the Snows," which taught him to shape his later masterpiece, "The Call of the Wild" in the lecture titled "Learning to Write The Call of the Wild: Jack London's Northland Stories and A Daughter of the Snows"

July 16 — Susan Nuernberg looks at how London's most-famous tale of naked, howling savagery has survived its transformation into film by viewing clips and discussing the success in capturing the power and beauty of the novel on film in the lecture titled "Hollywood Takes On The Call of the Wild"

July 23 — Robert Coleman-Senghor contrasts the experiences of John Muir with those of Jack London and explore the implications of topography and climate in shaping London’s narratives and aesthetic in the lecture titled "The White Sublime: The Aesthetics of Vastness in Jack London's Northland Stories"

July 30 — Daniel Dyer discusses the foundation of reality (historical, geographical) underlying The Call of the Wild and showing historical photographs of many/most of the sites London mentions in the novella in the lecture titled "Answering The Call of the Wild on the Long Trail of Jack and Buck." According to Dyer, "London was not imagining these sites; he was remembering them."

August 6 — Jeanne Reesman shares her research and writings on the topic in a lecture on race in London's Yukon fiction, particularly on The Call of the Wild as a type of slave narrative in the lecture titled "Racing Wilderness: Race and Slavery in The Call of the Wild"

August 13 — Fireside Tales: Dramatic readings of Jack London's" To Build A Fire" and excerpts from other Northland Stories. Free in Alumni Amphitheatre.

For further information, contact Barbara Brooks, Jack London Lecture Series, (707) 664-2353.