The Architecture of Community

Leon Krier

Leon Krier is one of the best known and most provocative architects and urban theoreticians in the world, and a leading influence on today's generation of classical and traditional architects and planners. In The Architecture of Community, Mr. Krier refines and distills forty years of thinking on the making of sustainable, humane, and attractive villages, towns, and cities, and shares thoughts on how to make today's communities more vibrant. The book includes drawings, diagrams, and photographs of his built works, which have not been widely seen until now.

This is a unique opportunity to hear and meet Mr. Krier at his only appearance in Philadelphia, and it promises to be a lively evening.

Carpenter's Hall

320 Chestnut Street

Philadelphia, PA, 19106

This is a TICKETED event; $20 General Admission, $10 for ICA & CA members, FREE for students. Advance registration is requested; please call 215-790-0300, or email icacaphila@verizon.net

Deborah Willis

A graduate of the Philadelphia College of Art, Deborah Willis--a 2005 Guggenheim Fellow and a 2000 MacArthur Fellow--chairs the Photography Department at New York University. Dedicated to sharing visual representations of the African American experience, Willis authored the groundbreaking and highly praised book Reflections in Black, a collection of photographs of African American life from 1840 to the present, as well as The Black Female Body and VanDerZee: The Portraits of James VanDerZee. Her new book, Posing Beauty, was inspired by a realization she had as a student in the 1970s: that images of black beauty did not exist in the mainstream culture. This arresting new collection of photographs of African Americans, from Billie Holiday to Muhammad Ali to Michele Obama, redefines what it means to be "beautiful."

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click HERE

Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong

Terry Teachout writes about literature and the arts for the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and the New York Times, among many other publications. The Washington Post described his biography, The Skeptic: A Life of H.L. Mencken, as "a balanced, judicious assessment, flecked with sharply critical insights." Drawing on several previously unavailable sources, including hundreds of hours of backstage recordings, Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong offers new insight into the life of the legendary jazz musician.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click HERE

How Capitalism Will Save Us

Steve Forbes

Can democratic capitalism still be effective in improving our lives? In the wake of the nation's worst recession in decades, people's faith in our capitalist system has been deeply shaken.

In his newest book, How Capitalism Will Save Us: Why Free People and Free Markets are the Best Answer in Today's Economy, Forbes Media chairman and CEO, Steve Forbes, posits that when free people in free markets have energy to solve problems and meet the needs and wants of others, they turn scarcity into abundance and develop the innovations that are the foremost drivers of economic growth. Join us to hear his thoughts on why capitalism is the world's greatest economic success story.

The Crystal Tea Room

Wanamaker Building

100 East Penn Square

Philadelphia, PA, 19107

This is a TICKETED event; for registration and additional information, please click here

Julie Powell

Julie Powell, tired of working dead-end jobs, decided to try something new. What she started was a year-long odyssey cooking every recipe in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking and blogging about it. The resultant book, Julie and Julia, spent weeks on the New York Times Best Sellers list, earned a 2006 Quill Award, and was adapted into a major motion picture starring Meryl Streep. Her new book, Cleaving, chronicles a new chapter in Powell's personal life and offers another facet of her fascination with food and a new fixation: butchery. Described as "hilarious and ferociously articulate" by Entertainment Weekly, Powell brings a fresh new voice to the art of biography and cooking.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click HERE

The Fourth Part of the World: The Race to the Ends of the Earth, and the Epic Story of the Map That Gave America Its Name

Toby Lester 

For millennia Europeans believed that the world consisted of three parts: Europe, Africa, and Asia. They drew the three continents in countless shapes and sizes on their maps, but occasionally they hinted at the existence of a "fourth part of the world," a mysterious, inaccessible place, separated from the rest by a vast expanse of ocean. It was a land of myth -- until 1507, that is, when Martin Waldseemüller and Matthias Ringmann, two obscure scholars working in the mountains of eastern France, made it real. Columbus had died the year before convinced that he had sailed to Asia, but Waldseemüller and Ringmann, after reading about the Atlantic discoveries of Columbus's contemporary Amerigo Vespucci, came to a startling conclusion: Vespucci had reached the fourth part of the world. To celebrate his achievement, Waldseemüller and Ringmann printed a huge map, for the first time showing the New World surrounded by water and distinct from Asia, and in Vespucci's honor they gave this New World a name: America.

The Fourth Part of the World is the story behind that map, a thrilling saga of geographical and intellectual exploration, full of outsize thinkers and voyages. Taking a kaleidoscopic approach, Toby Lester traces the origins of our modern worldview. His narrative sweeps across continents and centuries, zeroing in on different portions of the map to reveal strands of ancient legend, Biblical prophecy, classical learning, medieval exploration, imperial ambitions, and more.

The Athenaeum of Philadelphia

219 South 6th Street

Philadelphia, PA, 19106

This is a FREE event, but reservations are required; please contact Susan Gallo at 215.925.2688, or email sgallo@philaathenaeum.org

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

Daniel H. Pink

Forget everything you thought you knew about how to motivate people--at work, at school, at home. It's wrong. As Daniel H. Pink explains in his new and paradigm-shattering book Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, the secret to high performance and satisfaction in today's world is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.

Drawing on four decades of scientific research on human motivation, Pink exposes the mismatch between what science knows and what business does--and how that affects every aspect of our lives. He demonstrates that while the old-fashioned carrot-and-stick approach worked successfully in the 20th century, it's precisely the wrong way to motivate people for today's challenges. Drive is bursting with big ideas--the rare book that will change how you think and transform how you live.

Friends Select School 

1651 Benjamin Franklin Parkway

Philadelphia, PA, 19103

For more information, please click here

Remarkable Creatures

Tracy Chevalier

Tracy Chevalier is the author of the international bestseller Girl with a Pearl Earring. The book, based on the creation of the famous painting by Johannes Vermeer, was adapted into an award-winning film starring Colin Firth and Scarlett Johansson. Noted for her mesmerizing storytelling and the fluid use of period language, Chevalier pays exquisite attention to detail in both plot and setting in her historical novels. Her latest novel, Remarkable Creatures, is based on the life of the 19th-century English fossil collector Mary Anning, who discovered the first complete specimen of an ichthyosaur.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click here

Daring Young Men: The Heroism and Triumph of the Berlin Airlift

Richard Reeves

Acclaimed presidential biographer Richard Reeves discusses his new book, Daring Young Men: The Heroism and Triumph of the Berlin Airlift.  Reeves recounts the stories of the brave pilots who risked their lives to supply humanitarian aid to those who were considered enemies only a few short years earlier during World War II.  Utilizing previously unpublished documents and numerous interviews, Reeves provides a voice for these pilots to tell their stories.  Thomas Childers, Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania, moderates.

The pilots who took part in the Berlin Airlift supplied vital goods to West Berlin, due to the land and water blockade instituted by the Soviets in 1948.  Over the following year, some 227,000 flights were made with an average of 8,000 tons of goods delivered daily, mainly consisting of food and fuel.  The success of the Berlin Airlift is viewed as the first Cold War victory for Britain and America against the Soviet Union.  The Soviets were humiliated, as they never believed such a plan could work, and hoped to push the Allied powers out of the city.  By May of 1949, the Soviets lifted the blockade, but goods continued to be delivered until September of that year, in order to provide a surplus for the people of West Berlin.

A starred review in Publishers Weekly says “Reeves gives us a mesmerizing portrait of America at its best when challenged by Russia’s tyranny.”

Annenberg Center for Education and Outreach
F.M. Kirby Auditorium
National Constitution Center
Independence Mall
525 Arch Street
Philadelphia, PA

 This is a FREE event; but reservations are required. Please call 215.409.6700, or click here

All Things at Once

Mika Brzezinski

In conversation with Joe Scarborough

One of television’s most outspoken and respected journalists, Mika Brzezinski is an MSNBC anchor and co-host of Morning Joe with Joe Scarborough—a program Time magazine calls “revolutionary” and the New York Times ranked as the top news show of 2008. She also appears on NBC Nightly News and Weekend Today. Prior to joining NBC, Brzezinski worked at CBS, where she anchored CBS Evening News Weekend Edition and later became the network’s principal “Ground Zero” reporter following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Her book, All Things at Once, is a motivational book geared toward helping women deal with the unique challenges they face in balancing personal life, family life, and career.

Joe Scarborough is the host of Morning Joe. He served as a member of the United States Congress for seven years and is the author of The Last Best Hope, which outlines a plan to guide conservatives back to a political majority after their defeats in the 2006 midterm and the 2008 Presidential elections. Along with Brzezinski, Joe can be heard daily on the Joe Scarborough Show, a syndicated talk-radio show on ABC Radio Networks.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click here

36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction

Rebecca Goldstein

Rebecca Goldstein’s fiction explores “the dichotomies between mind and body, intellect and passion, logos and eros,” according to one New York Times reviewer. A professor of philosophy, a MacArthur Fellow, and a 1995 winner of the National Jewish Book Award, Goldstein is the author of several novels, including The Mind-Body Problem, Properties of Light, and Mazel. She is also the author of the nonfiction biographies Incompleteness: The Proof and Paradox of Kurt Gödel and Betraying Spinoza. In 36 Arguments for the Existence of God, Goldstein combines fiction and philosophy to tell the story of Cass Seltzer, an atheist who must reexamine religion’s place in his life when his novel becomes a surprise bestseller.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click here

The Swan Thieves

Elizabeth Kostova

The fastest-selling debut novel in U.S. history, Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian was the first debut novel to enter the New York Times Best Sellers list at no. 1. The culmination of 10 years of research, the intricately plotted historical novel brought to life the story behind the legend of Vlad the Impaler who inspired the Dracula legend. In her eagerly awaited second novel, Kostova unspools a sweeping tale of historical intrigue spanning centuries and continents—with madness, obsession, and the power of art to preserve human hope taking center stage.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click here

The Unnamed 

Joshua Ferris

Joshua Ferris’s debut novel, Then We Came to the End, was translated into 24 different languages, was a finalist for the National Book Award, and won the 2008 PEN/Hemingway Award. Written in the stylistically challenging first-person plural, the novel—an account of a failing Chicago advertising agency—captured the desperation of office workers as they faced downturns and layoffs in their company. A critic for Kirkus Reviews called the book a “wickedly incisive satire of office groupthink.” In The Unnamed, Ferris follows a man who had the perfect job and the perfect family—until his undiagnosable disease, which forces him to drop what he is doing at any given moment and walk aimlessly for days on end, threatens to destroy them both.

The Privileges

Jonathan Dee

Jonathan Dee is a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine, a frequent contributor to Harper’s, and the former senior editor of The Paris Review. He is the author of four previous novels, including Palladio. From advertising’s corrosive impact on society to the frenzy caused by media and celebrity, Dee “is the kind of writer who thinks hard about contemporary realities and then builds sturdy, stately novels of ideas around them” (New York Times). Of The Privileges, Dee’s new novel, author Jonathan Franzen writes, “Mr. Dee has given us a cunning, seductive novel about the people we thought we’d all agreed to hate. His case study of American mega-wealth is delicious.”

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click here

The Will of the People: How Public Opinion Has Influenced the Supreme Court and Shaped the Meaning of the Constitution

Barry Friedman

In conversation with Lee Epstein and Jeffrey Rosen

The National Constitution Center and the University of Pennsylvania Law School welcome Lee Epstein, Barry Friedman and Jeffrey Rosen for a conversation about the Supreme Court’s relationship to American popular opinion. Guests will discuss Friedman’s thesis from his new book, The Will of the People, which states that the justices and the people are partners in a “marriage” that sidesteps the two elected branches. Friedman does not argue that the justices and the people are always in agreement, "but rather that they come into line with one another over time.” Veteran Supreme Court watcher and SCOTUSblog correspondent Lyle Denniston moderates.

Annenberg Center for Education and Outreach
F.M. Kirby Auditorium
National Constitution Center
Independence Mall
525 Arch Street
Philadelphia, PA

 This is a FREE event; but reservations are required. Please call 215.409.6700, or click here

Morning Haiku

Sonia Sanchez

An acclaimed poet, activist, and scholar, Sonia Sanchez is the former Laura Carnell Professor of English and Women's Studies at Temple University. Called a “lion in literature’s forest” by Maya Angelou, Sanchez has written more than a dozen books of poetry, including the American Book Award-winner Homegirls and Handgrenades. Using black dialect as a poetic medium, Sanchez writes elegantly on topics like bigotry, poverty, and drug abuse. Her new book of poems is a collection of haiku that celebrates the lives and mourns the deaths of revered African-American leaders.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click here

Comeback America: Turning the Country Around and Restoring Fiscal Responsibility

David Walker

Former Comptroller General of the United States and head of the U.S. Government Accountability Office David M. Walker joins the Center to discuss his important new book, Comeback America: Turning the Country Around and Restoring Fiscal Responsibility. For years, Walker warned Congress–and the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations–that America faced a large and growing fiscal imbalance due largely to known demographic trends and rising health care costs. Unfortunately, the numbers have gotten worse and our fiscal gap has grown dramatically in recent years.

Walker’s book includes a range of policy proposals to control spending, save Social Security, dramatically alter our health care system, reform our tax system, and re-engineer the base of the federal government —all taking into account the Obama Administration's efforts to-date. It lays out a comprehensive reform plan that Walker maintains is needed to ensure that America's future will be better than its past.

Annenberg Center for Education and Outreach
F.M. Kirby Auditorium
National Constitution Center
Independence Mall
525 Arch Street
Philadelphia, PA

 This is a FREE event; but reservations are required. Please call 215.409.6700, or click here

Rediscovering Values: On Wall Street, Main Street, and Your Street

Jim Wallis

When we start with the wrong question, no matter how good an answer we get, it won't give us the results we want. Rather than joining the throngs who are asking, When will this economic crisis be over? Jim Wallis says the right question to ask is How will this crisis change us? The worst thing we can do now, Wallis tells us, is to go back to normal. Normal is what got us into this situation. We need a new normal, and this economic crisis is an invitation to discover what that means. In the pages of this book, Wallis provides us with a moral compass for this new economy -- one that will guide us on Wall Street, Main Street, and Your Street.

Friends Select School
1651 Benjamin Franklin Parkway
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; but reservations are required. Please RSVP with Jan Burns at janb@friends-select.org, or call 215.561.5900 ex. 129 if you plan to attend. Walk-ins will be admitted the night of the event if seating is available. For more information about the event and Friends Select School, please click here

Bomb Power: The Modern Presidency and the National Security State

Garry Wills

A prolific historian and critic, Garry Wills won the Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction for Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America. He has received the National Book Critics Circle Award twice and was awarded the National Medal for the Humanities in 1998. His histories—which also include Nixon Agonistes and Inventing America—offer non-traditional, yet thoroughly researched and well-argued theories that one Chicago Tribune reviewer finds “boldly revisionist and intoxicatingly original.” Bomb Power reveals how the atomic bomb transformed our nation by dramatically increasing the power of the American president and redefining the government as a national security state.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a TICKETED event; $14 General Admission, $7 Students. Tickets on sale Friday, January 15 at 10:00 a.m. at freelibrary.org/authorevents or by phone at 1-800-595-4TIX (4849).

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click here

Racing While Black: How an African-American Stock Car Team Made Its Mark on NASCAR

Leonard T. Miller

In the primarily white, Southern world of NASCAR, black drivers are extremely rare and black-owned teams nearly nonexistent. Yet Leonard T. Miller—son of the black motor racing pioneer Leonard W. Miller—has owned and run Miller Racing for more than 15 years. In 2005, Miller Racing became the first African-American team to win a track championship in NASCAR history, creating new opportunities for black drivers with their victory. In Racing While Black, Miller talks frankly about the realities of NASCAR culture and his dream of changing the way racing fans view skin color.

Central Library
1901 Vine St
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103

This is a FREE event; no tickets or reservations are required.

For more information, call 215.567.4341, or click here