KRAVIS CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS PRESENTS THE ‘KRAVIS BOOK CLUB’
Summer book club hosted by award-winning playwright and novelist, Julie Gilbert
(West Palm Beach, FL.) – This summer, the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts welcomes avid readers to join in its first-ever virtual Kravis Book Club to verbally explore the texts of three award-winning novels via Zoom with writer and teacher, Julie Gilbert.
Participants in the book club will discuss the intricacies of each novel and are encouraged to share their interpretations with Gilbert who is a novelist, biographer, playwright and teacher. She was nominated for a National Book Critic’s Circle Award for Ferber: A Biography of Edna Ferber and Her Circle and a Pulitzer Prize nomination for Opposite Attraction: The Lives of Erich Maria Remarque and Paulette Goddard. Gilbert has taught fiction writing and playwriting at New York University and Florida Atlantic University and runs The Writers’ Academy at the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts.
“I was born into a literary and theatrical family – my great aunt was the writer Edna Ferber so I’m thrilled to be hosting the Kravis Book Club this summer,” said Gilbert. “I think everyone should have the opportunity to learn something new and broaden their artistic horizons. That is why I take immense pride in teaching people about my passions: fiction writing and playwriting.”
The three discussions in the book club include:
- Francois Sagan, Bonjour Tristesse, on July 13 – 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m.
- Tove Jansson, The Summer Book, on August 3 – 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m.
- Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, on August 24 – 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m.
“The Kravis Book Club was created to stay connected to our patrons and friends through this pandemic and we are so thankful to have Julie Gilbert hosting our new program,” said Tracy Butler, Director of Education for the Kravis Center. “The Kravis Center is exploring new ways to keep the arts in our homes and the book club is a great addition because the show must go on!”
Francoise Sagan’s Bonjour Tristesse is an internationally beloved story of a precocious teenager’s attempts to understand and control the world around her. Endearing seventeen-year-old Cecile joins her father and his mistress for a two-month summer vacation in a villa outside Paris. All is well until Cecile’s late mother’s best friend, Anne, arrives and intrudes upon a young girl’s pleasures. Cecile and her lover planned to keep the budding relationships between the adults apart with tragic consequences.
The Summer Book is a novel written by Finnish author Tove Jansson in 1972 and explores the relationship between an elderly woman and her six-year-old granddaughter Sophia as they spend a summer together on a small island in the Gulf of Finland. They adventure through nature, talk about life and everything in between except for their feelings about Sophia’s mother’s death and their love for one another.
Joan Didion’s memoir, The Year of Magical Thinking is an account of the year following the death of the author’s husband John Gregory Dunne. Didion explores a personal and universal experience: a portrait of a marriage – and a life, in good times and bad – that speaks to those that have ever lost a loved one.
The entire series is $75 with limited availability in each discussion. For more information about the Kravis Center or to sign-up for the Kravis Book Club please visit www.kravis.org.
The Kravis Center is a not-for-profit performing arts center located at 701 Okeechobee Blvd. in West Palm Beach, FL. The Center’s mission is to enhance the quality of life in Palm Beach County by presenting a diverse schedule of national and international artists and companies of the highest quality, by offering comprehensive arts education programs – serving nearly 3 million students since its inception; by providing a Palm Beach County home for local and regional arts organizations to showcase their work; and by providing an economic catalyst and community leadership in West Palm Beach, supporting efforts to increase travel and tourism to Palm Beach County.