Lecture at UW

"Whole Sight: The Intersection of Culture, Faith, and the Imagination"
By Charles Johnson
*2006-2007 Solomon Katz Distinguished Lectures in the Humanities*
Thursday, February 1, 2007
7:00 pm
Room 120, UW Kane Hall
Reception to follow

From his creative beginnings as a political cartoonist and journalist to his success as a novelist, essayist, short story writer, screen-and-teleplay writer, and university professor, Charles Johnson's life is a model of interdisciplinarity. In his talk Johnson will address his personal journey in finding his passion as an artist, a writer, and a scholar. He will discuss how various interrelated factors such as race, culture, faith, and history converged to shape his work.

Charles Johnson holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy and is the S. Wilson and Grace M. Pollock Professor of English at the University of Washington. A 1998 MacArthur Fellow, Dr. Johnson received the 1990 National Book Award for his novel Middle Passage (1990) and was a 2002 recipient of the Academy Award for Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He has published collections of short fiction, screenplays, and critical essays on literature and Buddhism, and has written numerous articles on writing, education, and other contemporary issues. Recent publications include Dr. King's Refrigerator and Other Bedtime Stories (2005), Turning the Wheel: Essays on Buddhism and Writing (2003), and Africans in America: America's Journey through Slavery (1998), the companion book for the PBS series co-authored with Patricia Smith.

For further information, please call (206) 543-3920 or visit www.simpsoncenter.org.