Honors Forum Lecture Series - "From Tijuana to Harvard and Beyond: One Writer's Journey"

This lecture is part of the 2009-2010 Honors Forum Lecture Series, "The Paradox of Affluence: Choices, Challenges, and Consequences."


Guest:
Luis Alberto Urrea, 2005 Pulitzer Prize finalist for nonfiction and member of the Latino Literature Hall of Fame, is a prolific and acclaimed writer who uses his dual-culture life experiences to explore greater themes of love, loss and triumph.

Born in Tijuana, Mexico to a Mexican father and an American mother, Urrea has published extensively in all the major genres, and is currently published by Little, Brown and Company. The critically acclaimed author of 11 books, Urrea is an award-winning poet and essayist. The Devil’s Highway, his 2004 non-fiction account of a group of Mexican immigrants lost in the Arizona desert, won the 2004 Lannan Literary Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the Pacific Rim Kiriyama Prize. A national best-seller, The Devil’s Highway was also named a Best Book of the Year by The Los Angeles Times, The Miami Herald, The Chicago Tribune, The Kansas City Star, and many other publications.

Urrea’s first book, Across the Wire, was named a New York Times Notable Book and won the Christopher Award. He received the 1999 American Book Award for his memoir, Nobody’s Son: Notes from an American Life. In 2000, Urrea was voted into the Latino Literature Hall of Fame following the publication of Vatos. Urrea’s book of short stories, Six Kinds of Sky, was named the 2002 small-press Book of the Year in fiction by the editors of ForeWord magazine. He has also won a Western States Book Award in poetry for The Fever of Being and was in the 1996 Best American Poetry Collection.

Urrea’s most recent book, The Hummingbird’s Daughter, is the culmination of twenty years of research and writing. The historical novel tells the story of Teresa Urrea, sometimes known as The Saint of Cabora and the Mexican Joan of Arc.

Urrea attended the University of California at San Diego, earning an undergraduate degree in writing, and did his graduate studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder. He is currently a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Where:
Phoenix College - Bulpitt Auditorium
1202 W. Thomas Rd.

When:
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
7 p.m.

Admission:
Free and open to the public

More Information:
Call (480) 731-8300