Public, The Vermont Book Shop, Town Hall Theater

Julia Alvarez in converation with Carolyn Kuebler

 

Alma Cruz, the celebrated writer at the heart of The Cemetery of Untold Stories, doesn’t want to end up like her friend, a novelist who fought so long and hard to finish a book that it threatened her sanity. So when Alma inherits a small plot of land in the Dominican Republic, her homeland, she has the beautiful idea of turning it into a place to bury her untold stories—literally. She creates a graveyard for the manuscript drafts and the characters whose lives she tried and failed to bring to life and who still haunt her.

Alma wants her characters to rest in peace. But they have other ideas and soon begin to defy their author: they talk back to her and talk to one another behind her back, rewriting and revising themselves. Filomena, a local woman hired as the groundskeeper, becomes a sympathetic listener to the secret tales unspooled by Alma’s characters. Among them, Bienvenida, dictator Rafael Trujillo’s abandoned wife who was erased from the official history, and Manuel Cruz, a doctor who fought in the Dominican underground and escaped to the United States.

The Cemetery of Untold Stories asks: Whose stories get to be told, and whose buried? Finally, Alma finds the meaning she and her characters yearn for in the everlasting vitality of stories. Julia Alvarez reminds us that the stories of our lives are never truly finished, even at the end.

About Julia:

Julia Alvarez left the Dominican Republic for the United States in 1960 at the age of ten. She is the author of six novels, three books of nonfiction, three collections of poetry, and eleven books for children and young adults. She has taught and mentored writers in schools and communities across America and, until her retirement in 2016, was a writer in residence at Middlebury College. Her work has garnered wide recognition, including a Latina Leader Award in Literature from the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute, the Hispanic Heritage Award in Literature, the Woman of the Year by Latina magazine, and inclusion in the New York Public Library’s program “The Hand of the Poet: Original Manuscripts by 100 Masters, from John Donne to Julia Alvarez.” In the Time of the Butterflies, with over one million copies in print, was selected by the National Endowment for the Arts for its national Big Read program, and in 2013 President Obama awarded Alvarez the National Medal of Arts in recognition of her extraordinary storytelling.

Julia will appear on stage in conversation with Carolyn Kuebler, editor of the literary journal based in Middlebury, New England Review. Kuebler’s debut novel, Liquid, Fragile, Perishable will go on sale May 7.

Producer: MCTV

Public, Town Hall Theater, Up For Discussion

Up For Discussion: Reimagining Stories, Translation and Adaptation with Michael Katz & Chris Keathley

 

Join us for quarterly talks with local experts and participate in roundtable conversations in a convivial atmosphere over light snacks and with a beverage (cash bar). Conceived by VBS owner Becky Dayton as a way for Middlebury College and other professional communities to come together with townspeople of all walks of life to share ideas, Up for Discussion has, thanks to the hard work of Town Hall Theater’s executive director Lisa Mitchell, been underwritten by Vermont Humanities.

Former Dean of the Middlebury Language Schools and Professor Emeritus of Russian and east European studies Michael Katz joins Professor of Film and Media Culture Chris Keathley to discuss “Reimagine Stories: Translation and Adaptation.”

Thanks to a grant from Vermont Humanities, Vermont Book Shop and Town Hall Theater present a new, free, quarterly series designed to spark community conversation. “Up for Discussion” features local experts in their fields, many of whom are Middlebury College professors, sharing timely topics that span literature, art, film, and contemporary issues.

Producer: MCTV

At the Ilsley, Public

Sharing the Trail: Get to Know the Mammals of the TAM

 

We all know and love the Trail Around Middlebury; with its streams, wetlands, forests, and fields, it is the perfect place to spend some time outside. But we are not the only animals that use this space. The qualities of the TAM that make us love it so much are the same qualities that animals such as deer, coyotes, foxes, squirrels, and many more need for their habitat. We must learn to share this space with them.

This talk is on the different habitat preferences and activity levels of mammals on the TAM and how human activities can impact them. Explore the activity of these mammals through photos and videos from trail cameras set by Middlebury College students this past fall and hear what they can tell us about the trail’s community. This recreation area is vital for both human and wildlife health, so we must learn to coexist with all its inhabitants.

Producer: MCTV

Public, Educational, and Governmental Access for Middlebury, Vermont