KVCC

San Francisco-based author Rebecca Solnit will speak at Kalamazoo Valley Community College on March 24 and 25 as a part of the annual Visiting Writers Series. English instructor Rob Haight introduced the Visiting Writers series on the Kalamazoo Valley campus 13 years ago to offer students and the community the opportunity to meet professional writers and listen to their work.

Solnit is the author of 13 books and numerous essays in museum catalogs and anthologies about art, landscape, community, ecology, politics, hope, and memory. She has worked with Native American land rights, antinuclear, human rights, antiwar and other issues as an activist and journalist.

A product of the California public education system from kindergarten to graduate school, she is a contributing editor to Harper’s and frequent contributor to the political site Tomdispatch.com. She has made her living as an independent writer since 1988.

In 2010 Utne Reader magazine named Solnit one of the "25 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World." The Faraway Nearby was nominated for a National Book Award and shortlisted for the 2013 National Book Critics Circle Award. In preparation for her visit, several Kalamazoo Valley English classes are currently reading The Faraway Nearby.

Solnit will talk about her writing from 10 to 10:45 a.m. and read from her work from 2:15 to 3 p.m. during both days of her visit. The events, located in the Student Commons Theater at the Texas Township Campus, are free and open to the public.

For more information about the Visiting Writers series, contact Kalamazoo Valley English instructor and Visiting Writers Series coordinator Rob Haight at 269.488.4452 or rhaight@kvcc.edu.