DANBURY, CONN. — The Western Connecticut State University Department of English will host a free, public talk by noted author and educator Sheila Kohler on Thursday, Sept. 26, 2019. Kohler will discuss “Becoming Jane Eyre: The Interplay of Fact and Fiction in Historical Narrative” at 12:30 p.m. in Room 102 of Warner Hall on the WCSU Midtown campus, 181 White St. in Danbury.
Kohler has authored 10 novels, three volumes of short fiction, a memoir and many essays. She has taught at Columbia University, Sarah Lawrence University, Bennington College and Princeton University, and has won the O. Henry Prize twice. Her most recent novel is “Dreaming for Freud,” based on Freud’s “Dora: An Analysis of a Case of Hysteria.” Her work has been included in Best American Short Stories and published in 13 countries. Her novel “Cracks” was made into a film with directors Jordan and Ridley Scott, with Eva Green playing Miss G.
WCSU English Department Chair Dr. Shouhua Qi invited Kohler to speak on campus.
“If Jane Eyre is Charlotte Bronte’s soul speaking in her monumental classic novel, ‘Becoming Jane Eyre’ is also soul speaking to soul; it is Sheila Kohler becoming Charlotte Bronte becoming Jane Eyre,” Qi said. “It would be fascinating to listen to the author who put both a tremendous amount of research and her power of imagination to work in creating this marvelous masterpiece.”
The talk will be free and the public is invited. It is sponsored by the Macricostas School of Arts & Sciences and the Department of English. For more information, send an email to qis@wcsu.edu.
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