Lincoln's Birthday Talk by Noted Essayist
Essayist and author Andrew Delbanco will present a lecture titled "Lincoln in His Time and Ours" on Lincoln's birthday, Feb. 12, at 4:30 p.m. in The Kaleidoscope Lenfest Theater.  The lecture is the first in a two-part series titled "Lincoln's Reflective Statesmanship." Delbanco is the editor of The Portable Abraham Lincoln (1992) and author of Melville: His World and Work (2005), and Required Reading: Why Our American Classics Matter Now (1997).  He has written extensively on American history and culture for publications such as The New Republic, New York Times, New Yorker, Commonweal, and Partisan Review.  He was named by Time Magazine as "America's Best Social Critic."
Completing the Lincoln series will be Allen C. Guelzo, Henry R. Luce III Professor of the Civil War Era at Gettysburg College, on March 2, at 7 p.m. in the Lenfest Theater in The Kaleidoscope Performing Arts Center.

Jennifer Finney Boylan to Speak
Jennifer Finney Boylan, the author of Remind Me To Murder You Later (1988); The Planets (1991); The Constellations (1994); and Getting In (1997), will speak at Ursinus on Friday, Feb. 13, at 7 p.m. in Bomberger Auditorium.
Boylan is widely praised in publications such as The New Yorker, Los Angeles Times, New York Newsday and Entertainment Weekly, for her characterizations of people faced with atypical dilemmas, either caused by their own hands or by the spinning forces of life.  Her memoir, She's Not There, published by Doubleday in 2003, was the first bestselling work by a transgendered American; until 2001 she published under the name James Boylan.  Currently she is the Director of Creative Writing at Colby College, Maine.  A native of Valley Forge, Pa., she grew up in nearby Delaware County.

The Langston Hughes Project
"The Langston Hughes Project" will come to Ursinus on Wednesday, Feb. 18.  The multimedia event will take place at 7:30 p.m. in the Studio Theater of the Kaleidoscope Performing Arts Center.  The program is free, but tickets are required.  Please call 610.409.3795 for information and reservations.
"The Langston Hughes Project" is based on the poem Ask Your Mama: 12 Moods for Jazz by Harlem Renaissance writer Langston Hughes.  It is his homage in verse and music to the struggle for artistic and social freedom at home and abroad during the early 1960's. Hughes died in 1967, before the piece could be performed.
In 1995, Dr. Ron McCurdy, musical director for the The Langston Hughes project and Professor of Jazz Studies at the University of Southern California, set the text of the poem to music, and it was performed by his jazz quartet.  The complete multimedia presentation includes the spoken word, jazz quartet and videography.