Calendar of Big Read Events

• Tuesday - February 9 - 7:00 pm
  Peoria Reads Mayoral Proclamation - City Hall (419 Fulton St. Peoria, IL 61602)
  
• Tuesday - March 2 - 7:00-9:00 pm
  Travels Through Literature Presents The Great Gatsby
  Illinois Central College North - 5407 N. University, Peoria IL 61614
  Arbor Hall Auditorium
  Mike Foster, retired professor of English and Journalism at Illinois Central College will discuss The Great Gatsby and the life of F. Scott Fitzgerald. A question and answer/discussion period will follow, This event is free and open to the public.
  
  
• Friday - March 5, 2010 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm
  Gatsby Night at Live at the Five Spot
  Contemporary Arts Center, 305 SW Water Street, Peoria, IL 61602
  Join us for an evening of music with jazz band Dorann and the Soul Mystics. Take yourself back to the Jazz Age, dress like a flapper or just enjoy the atmosphere. Admission is $7 for members, $10 for non-members. For more information call William at the Contemporary Arts Center, 309-674-6822.
  
  
• Saturday - March 6, 2010 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm
  Family Kick-Off Event
  Illinois Central College North, 5407 North University Street, Peoria, IL 61614 - Arbor Hall
  Learn about the “Roaring Twenties,” the era of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s "The Great Gatsby." Bring the whole family to this free event featuring activities, snacks, music, movies, and dance from the 1920s. Free and open to the public.
  
  

• Sunday - March 7, 2010 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm
  A Little Romance Book Club discusses "The Great Gatsby"
  Peoria Public Library--Lakeview Branch, 1137 West Lake, Peoria, IL 61614
  The A Little Romance Book Club meets the first Sunday of each month at the Lakeview Branch of the Peoria Public Library. On March 7, the group will discuss "The Great Gatsby" as a tragic love story.

• Wednesday - March 10, 2010 9:00 am – 10:30 am
  Maureen Corrigan presents "The Great Gatsby: The Great Un-American Novel
  Illinois Central College Performing Arts Center, One College Drive, East Peoria, IL 61635
  Maureen Corrigan, book critic for “Fresh Air,” heard nationally on NPR, and advisor to the National Endowment of the Arts’ “Big Read” project, will talk about "The Great Gatsby."

• Wednesday - March 10, 2010 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm
  Maureen Corrigan presents "The Great Gatsby: The Great Un-American Novel
  Peoria Public Library, Lakeview Branch, 1137 West Lake, Peoria, IL 61614
  Maureen Corrigan, book critic for “Fresh Air,” heard nationally on NPR, and advisor to the National Endowment of the Arts’ “Big Read” project, will talk about "The Great Gatsby."

• Thursday - March 11, 2010 9:00 am – 10:00 am
  Maureen Corrigan program - School Visit
  Peoria Notre Dame High School, 5105 North Sheridan Road, Peoria, IL 61614
  Maureen Corrigan, book critic for “Fresh Air,” heard nationally on NPR, and advisor to the National Endowment of the Arts’ “Big Read” project, will talk about "The Great Gatsby."

• Thursday - March 11, 2010 12:00 pm – 1:30 pm
  Lunch with Maureen Corrigan
  Childers Banquet Center, 3113 North Dries Lane, Peoria, IL 61604
  Luncheon with keynote by Maureen Corrigan, book critic for “Fresh Air,” heard nationally on NPR, and advisor to the National Endowment of the Arts’ “Big Read” project. Tickets are $18 each. Call Common Place at 309-674-3315 for reservations and information.

• Friday - March 12, 2010 7:00 pm
  A showing of the 1974 film version of The Great Gatsby, starring Robert Redford
  Apollo theater, 311 Main Street, Peoria, IL
  Suggested admission is $5.00 for adults and $4.00 for seniors and students. Steve Tarter will provide introductory comments. Free popcorn and soft drinks will be available.

• Thu, March 18, 2010 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm
  Jay Gatsby, Then and Now
  Illinois Central College North, 5407 North University Street, Peoria, IL 61614
  Arbor Hall Auditorium
  A panel of literary experts chose Jay Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald's Jazz-Age rogue, as its top fictional character since 1900. Join in a panel discussion with social service professionals and academics as they talk about the pursuit of the American Dream in Gatsby' day and now. Panelists include Dr. James Decker (Illinois Central College Professor of English), Carol May (Illinois Central College Professor of Sociology--Retired), Farrell Davies (CEO, Heatland Community Health Clinic), and Barbara Hartnett (Executive Director of Peoria Friendship House of Christian Service). - FREE

• Tuesday - March 23, 2010 9:00 am – 10:30 am
  Debra Conner program - School Visit
  Notre Dame High School, 5105 N Sheridan, Peoria, IL 61614
  Debra Conner portrays Zelda Fitzgerald! Her performance will include a first person monologue as well as question and answer sessions both in and out of character.
  

• Wednesday - March 24, 2010 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm
  Debra Conner portrays Zelda Fitzgerald
  Peoria Public Library, Lakeview Branch, 1137 W. Lake, Peoria IL 61614
  Debra Conner portrays Zelda Fitzgerald! Her performance will include a first person monologue as well as question and answer sessions both in and out of character.- FREE

• Saturday - March 27, 2010 2:00 pm
  Dr. Kendall Taylor Fitgerald scholar & author
  Peoria Public Library, Lakeview Branch, 1137 W. Lake, Peoria IL 61614
  Personal Legacy Workshop - Only you can narrate your life story. Writing your personal legacy will let you capture some of your famiyl's important information before it disapperars. Call 309-497-2185 for more information. - FREE

• Sunday - March 28, 2010 2:00 pm
  Dr. Kendall Taylor Fitgerald scholar & author
  Peoria Public Library, Lakeview Branch, 1137 W. Lake, Peoria IL 61614
  Dr. Kendall Taylor will talk about her books "Sometimes Madness is Wisdom: Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald: A Marriage" and the forthcoming "Mutual Madness: The Affair That Changed American Literature." - FREE

Debra Conner  began portraying poet Emily Dickinson in 1997 through a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. She has given performances that bring various literary personalities to life including Margaret Mitchell, Rebecca Harding Davis, and Zelda Fitzgerald across the country. She has been a part of the West Virginia Humanities Council’s History Alive! Program since 1998.  She also holds workshops in creative writing and has been published in many publications. Be sure to come and meet “Zelda” at one of the events planned for March 23 or 24, 2010.

Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air book critic lectures at Georgetown University. She is noted for her literary criticism, serving as a reviewer and columnist for The Washington Post’s Book World and as associate editor of and contributor to Mystery and Suspense Writers (Scribner.) Winner of the 1999 Edgar Award for Criticism presented by The Mystery Writers of America, she is also the author of Leave Me Alone, I’m Reading. She also serves on the advisory panel of The American Heritage Dictionary and chaired the Mystery and Suspense judge’s panel of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.

An expert on The Great Gatsby, Maureen is one of the featured speakers on The Great Gatsby Audio Guide being made available to the public during The Big Read Peoria Reads.  She says, “I think if I were on a desert island and I had to pick the American novel of the 20th century, it would be this one.”

Be sure to see Maureen Corrigan when she visits Peoria March 10 and 11, 2010. 

NPR’s Maureen Corrigan shares her “Big Reads”

by Mary Hilbert 

      From the moment Maureen Corrigan reached into her Christmas stocking at eight years old and pulled out a copy of Nancy Drew’s The Ghost of Black Wood Hall, she began to develop a lifelong fascination with the American mystery novel that would not only lead to an adulthood of literary enjoyment, but of professional success.      
    Today, Corrigan has transformed her childhood passion for flipping pages into a notable, if not enviable career. The winner of the 1999 Edgar Award for Criticism serves as a book reviewer for National Public Radio’s Fresh Air program, a contributor to Scribner’s Mystery and Suspense Writers series and a reviewer and columnist for the Washington Post’s Book World. Demanding? Perhaps. But she wouldn’t have it any other way.
     “My favorite aspect of working as a literary critic is reading, reading, reading,” Corrigan said, “Coupled with my work as a college professor teaching great books, I think I have the best job any passionate reader could ever imagine.”
     So what was it about the Nancy Drew mystery novels that caught Corrigan’s attention in the first place?
    “I think the initial appeal of that Nancy Drew story was the image it presented of a young woman- Nancy is always eighteen years old- who was completely autonomous and respected by the adult world for her smarts and courage,” Corrigan said.
     Years later, Corrigan still rereads her favorite girl detective’s series from time to time, reacquainting herself with the picturesque descriptions of “roadsters” and “titian” hair. As time has passed, Corrigan’s tastes have evolved.
    “I’m a fan of all sorts of mysteries and I’m lucky to get to indulge my appetite through my work on Fresh Air and as a monthly mystery columnist for The Washington Post. I love Lisa Scottoline’s comic mysteries set in Philadelphia, Morag Joss’s British psychological suspense stories, and Henning Mankell’s police procedurals set in Sweden,” Corrigan said.
     Corrigan’s passion however, is for the “American hard-boiled form: the tough guy and gal mysteries in which a lone detective roams the city streets, trying to carve out some justice in a world gone wrong.” Detective fiction writer Sara Paretsky is among Corrigan’s highest recommendations in this category.
    “I think her latest novel, Hardball (2009) was a standout novel,” Corrigan said, “It’s partly set in the turbulent Chicago of 1968. Paretsky manages to write sharp social commentary and concoct a gripping detective tale.”
    Despite Corrigan’s favorites among the contemporary writers of today, the classic American novel still holds a firm, irreplaceable position on her bookshelf.
     “I think Dashell Hammitt’s The Maltese Falcon -which is also on the Big Read list- is the greatest American mystery ever written.  In it Sam Spade wrestles with a set of moral choices in a universe where right and wrong have become-literally- very hard to discern,” Corrigan said
    As for 2010’s Big Read selection, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby?
     “…It contains the most gorgeous and melancholy passages about America that any writer has ever concocted,” Corrigan said.
     Corrigan, a Washington D.C. resident, is fortunate enough to live only five miles from the resting place of one of the most influential author’s in American history.
    “I visited Fitzgerald’s grave some years ago and told him that, in my opinion, he still holds the title as America’s most significant writer. By the way, the last sentence from the Great Gatsby is carved on Fitzgerald’s tombstone.”
     Corrigan will be presenting her thoughts on The Great Gatsby at Lakeview Branch Library Wednesday, March 10 at 7:00 p.m. She will also speak at the ICC Performing Arts Center at 9:00 a.m., March 10, and be the featured speaker for a luncheon at Childer’s Banquet Center at noon, March 11. Tickets for the luncheon are $18 each. For more information, call Common Place at 674-3315.