Speaker to discuss architecture and literature

The Southwestern Oregon Community College Arts and Lectures Committee is hosting a free talk by Diana Coogle on “Reading Houses: What Architecture tells us about Ourselves” at 7 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 22, in Eden Hall, room 1, on the Coos Bay campus.

Literature has been a lifelong passion for Coogle – an author, teacher, radio commentator, theater director and community volunteer – who pursued studies in literature and literary themes at Vanderbilt University and Cambridge University, where she was a Marshall Scholar. For three years, Coogle was a guest lecturer at Goteborgs Universitet in Goteborg, Sweden, where her love for literature found a new channel as she grew to appreciate the diverse landscapes of Sweden.

Coogle, who lives on a remote mountainside, is a regular commentator on Jefferson Public Radio, and her first book “Fire from the Dragon’s Tongue: Essays about Living with Nature in the Siskiyou Mountains” was a finalist for the Oregon Book Award. She is a frequent public speaker in organizations ranging from libraries to high schools and the National Forest Service to the Unitarian Fellowship.

The program is made possible by funding from the Oregon Council for the Humanities, an independent non-profit affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities that is dedicated to the belief that knowledge and ideas are fundamental to the health of communities. For more information about OCH’s programs and publications – including Oregon Chautauqua, Humanity in Perspective and “Oregon Humanities” magazine – those interested can go online to http://www.oregonhum.org.

Press Release Date: February 13, 2008