When Pages Breathe: Bringing Good Books to Life – An evening of reader’s theater

In conjunction with the Princeton University Library’s exhibition “In the Company of Good Books: From Shakespeare to Morrison,” in the Firestone Library’s Milberg Gallery the Lewis Center for the Arts’ presents When Pages Breathe: Bringing Good Books to Life. Four actors —Tony and Obie Award winner Ruben Santiago-Hudson, Tony-nominated writer and performer Sharon Washington, veteran Shakespearean actor Maren Maclean, and award-winning film, television and stage actor Antoinette LaVecchia—will read selected works from the exhibition. The exhibition, which honors the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s First Folio of 1623, draws from the Library’s diverse collection of English language literature and many of the writers and readers who brought life to English literature around the world, such as a 1598 first edition of Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost and Toni Morrison’s handwritten manuscript drafts of Desdemona. Selections to be read by the actors include Toni Morrison’s Beloved, John Milton, Mary Shelley, Jane Austen, Phyllis Wheatley, Gwendolyn Brooks, Maya Angelou, and Walt Whitman. Curated and hosted by faculty member Chesney Snow.

Exhibition tours at 5:30 p.m. at Firestone Library Milberg Library, reception at 6:30 p.m. in Chancellor Green Hyphen, and Reader’s Theater performance at 7 p.m. at Chancellor Green Rotunda on the Princeton University campus.

Free and open to the public; registration required.