Fall Cultural Season Sets New Course for Brooklyn Public Library

Patti Smith, Oliver Stone, Javier Arias Highlight A Season Developed by Internationally Renowned Cultural Curator Jakab Orsos

Grand Lobby at Central Library to Become Space for Readings, Forums, Performances

Brooklyn, NY— Brooklyn Public Library’s fall programming season signals a new direction for the institution, with creatively staged, provocative and inspiring events developed by Jakab Orsos, who recently joined BPL as its first-ever vice president of arts & culture.

The Library will welcome writer and musician Patti Smith, filmmaker Oliver Stone and Spanish novelist and translator Javier Marias, among other celebrated writers, artists and scholars. In October, the soaring lobby of Central Library will be the backdrop for a reading of Euripides’ Madness of Hercules, to be followed by a town hall-style conversation on policing and gun violence.

“The aim of Brooklyn Public Library’s fall season is to draw new audiences to the library and engage them with programs that explore a wide range of human experience,” said Brooklyn Public Library President and CEO Linda E. Johnson. “To do so, we’ve enlisted the aid of stirring, singular voices from the present and the past: Patti Smith on the will to live and create even in the depths of sorrow; Oliver Stone on the capacity of human beings—one in particular—to change the course of the world; and even Euripedes, whose work will inform a community conversation about the most complex and rending problems of our age. We look forward to welcoming patrons to these and numerous other challenging programs throughout the fall.”

Highlights of the fall season include:

  • September 6—Brooklyn author Jonathan Safran Foer will read an excerpt from his new novel Here I Am and discuss the creation of this monumental, heartbreaking work. Hosted by Congregation Beth Elohim.
  • September 11—Oliver Stone will screen his new movie, Snowden, and discuss privacy in an increasingly public world with Edward Snowden’s attorney Ben Wizner, director of the ACLU's Speech, Privacy and Technology Project.
  • September 15—Consummate rock icon Patti Smith will join Brooklyn Public Library, Community Bookstore and Congregation Beth Elohim to discuss her recent memoir, M Train.
  • September 18—A new guided yoga and live poetry series at Issue Project Room will open the Brooklyn Book Festival, transforming the Library's traditional model of staged performances and readings into a more tactile experience of art.
  • September 18—BPL will lead a panel at the Brooklyn Book Festival with leading architects and academics about the physical future of libraries in a digital age.
  • October 13—CODEPINK co-founder Medea Benjamin will discuss Kingdom of the Unjust, her exploration of the US government’s enduring, yet at times perplexing, alliance with Saudi Arabia.
  • October 29—BPL and Outside the Wire, a theater company that uses the medium to address social issues, will host a reading of Euripides' Madness of Hercules in the sprawling lobby of Central Library. The play will serve as a springboard for a frank conversation on gun violence with community members.
  • November 9—Internationally renowned Spanish novelist Javier Marias visits Central Library’s Dweck Center for the Brooklyn by the Book series to discuss his latest work, Thus Bad Begins, the story of a couple living in the shadow of a mysterious, unhappy history.

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About Brooklyn Public Library

Brooklyn Public Library (BPL) is an independent library system for the 2.5 million residents of Brooklyn. It is the fifth largest library system in the United States with 60 neighborhood libraries located throughout the borough. BPL offers free programs and services for all ages and stages of life, including a large selection of books in more than 30 languages, author talks, literacy programs and public computers. BPL’s eResources, such as eBooks and eVideos, catalog information and free homework help, are available to customers of all ages 24 hours a day at our website: www.bklynlibrary.org.