February is African American History Month. Come take a look at our book display in the lobby of Green's East Wing for a selection of titles that you can check out from the library.

You can read more at the African American History Month website, which includes this year's theme:

This year's theme "Black Women in American Culture and History" honors African American women and the myriad of roles they played in the shaping of our nation. The theme, chosen by the Association for the Study of African American Life and History urges all Americans to study and reflect on the value of their contribution to the nation.

You can watch here an interview with Henry Lowood, Curator for History of Science & Technology Collections and Film & Media Collections in the Stanford University Libraries. Howard Rheingold speaks with Lowood about the meaning of the word "curation" in an age of online information.

Robert Durling, Professor of Italian and English Literature, Emeritus, UC Santa Cruz, and one of the preeminent translators of Dante into English, will be speaking Thursday, 2 February 2012.

From the Continuing Studies web page:

Durling is the author of dozens of scholarly articles and three books on Italian Renaissance literature. In 1996, his eagerly awaited translation of Dante’s Inferno was published by Oxford University Press, followed by Purgatorio in 2003 and Paradiso in 2010. Durling’s translations have been described as “marvelous, in the richest medieval sense of the term.” When the Paradiso volume appeared, David Young of Oberlin College wrote that "The scholarship, as always, is graceful, comprehensive, and acute, and it surrounds a translation that is so carefully considered and fully realized as to be, at times, quite breathtaking."

In English, there is no poet of Dante’s stature except Shakespeare, and in Italy, he is regarded as so unapproachably supreme that he is referred to simply as "The Poet"—no qualifiers are necessary. In this talk, Robert Durling will discuss the challenges—and the exhilaration—of bringing the work of such a vast, intimidating, and luminous poet into English, and how reading him, 600 years after he wrote, can transfix us and even change our lives.

Thursday, 2 February 2012
7:00 pm
Annenberg Auditorium, Cummings Art Building
The event is free; no registration required.

The Hume Writing Center kicks off its Art of Writing program on Monday, 30 January 2012.

From the program flyer:

Come study the Art of Writing in intensive, fun, hands-on workshops with the dynamic faculty of the Creative Writing Program. You’ll leave with an expanded understanding of writing and a sheaf of pages. This free workshop series is open to students from all majors. And pizza will be served!

On Friday, 24 February 2012, the Hume Writing Center will be hosting A Celebration of Writing.

From the flyer:

Stanford’s Hume Writing Center is hosting a special reading for Parents' Weekend on Friday, February 24, from 8:00-9:00 p.m. We invite you to read from your work and hope you'll invite your parents and other visiting family members to read from theirs.

All events take place at the Hume Writing Center, Building 460, Margaret Jacks Hall, Room 020. Take a look at the documents attached below for more information.