Saturday by Ian McEwan

September 18, 2005

If you have read any other of McEwan’s works, you know he is a fine, gripping, amazingly well-informed writer who can take you from the operating room of a neurosurgeon to the spaces of a blues musician, to an anti-war protest in the London streets, to memories of 9/11, to the haunting images and sounds of possible terrorism and inward to the most moving struggles for meaning. How do we find the meaning of things today? What can we do to render our own lives meaningful? What does activism mean today? Resistance? Transformative thinking? I hope we can be stirred by Saturday, stirred enough to reach beyond where we are, to ponder feasible possibility.

Satellite Salon

Arlington, Virginia Mary Bullock, Host October 2, 2005

For more than ten years, Professor Maxine Greene has led a yearly series of Salons at her home in New York City, inviting teachers and other educators to participate in discussions of timely literature, pointed to the relevance of the arts in addressing the numerous problems of our times.

Salon enthusiasts find in these discussions a sense of possibility, imagining the world in humane terms, aiming to counter mindless and oppressive features of contemporary society, in our work and in our daily lives. Maxine often reminds us that we have the opportunity to build democracy when we meet in community. In that spirit you are welcome to join in a fruitful discussion of SATURDAY

Mary Bullock: marybullock@maxinegreene.org

Satellite Salon

Columbia, South Carolina Craig Kridel, Host October 2, 2005

The Museum of Education will stage a salon-informal discussion of Ian McEwan’s recent novel, Saturday. Maxine Greene will welcome us via telephone. We’ll proceed to discuss the novel and, at the end of the session, we will have another "wrap-up" telephone conversation with her. Lee Bauknight, faculty in the Department of English and former Associate Curator of the Museum of Education, will lead our discussion.

Please know that you and any of your friends, students, and colleagues are invited to attend. The "Greene Salon" is free and open to anyone who has read the novel. In accordance with Maxine’s life long efforts to build communities and public spaces, we recognized that an ongoing salon program would be most enjoyable and would come to represent the basic beliefs and intentions of the Museum of Education.

Craig Kridel: craigkridel@maxinegreene.org