POST's Wallace Stegner Lecture Series Presents Best-Selling Author Richard Preston
January 20, 2010
Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST) opens its Annual Wallace Stegner Lecture Series on February 8 with an illustrated talk by best-selling author Richard Preston. His book The Wild Trees tells the story of scientists Steve Sillett and Marie Antoine, who discovered a lost world in California’s most ancient redwood trees. Preston’s talk takes place at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts at 8:00 p.m. The author will answer audience questions and sign books at a reception afterward.
An experienced investigative journalist and gifted storyteller, Preston explores the startling biosystem found in the high canopy of the world’s tallest tree, the redwood, a species unique to a narrow band of coastal land from Humboldt and Del Norte counties to Big Sur. Preston became a skilled tree climber in order to tell the story of those who are committed to preserving this astonishing and largely unknown world.
Whatever his subject, Preston delivers a thoroughly researched view. His other best-selling books include The Hot Zone, The Cobra Event and The Demon in the Freezer. In The Hot Zone, he introduced the world to the threat of Ebola and other rainforest viruses. The book stayed on the New York Times best-seller list for 42 weeks, inspiring several fictional adaptations, including the hit film Outbreak, starring Dustin Hoffman.
Preston is a regular contributor to The New Yorker and has won the American Institute of Physics Award and the National Magazine Award, among other honors. He is a graduate of Pomona College and holds a doctorate in English from Princeton University.
POST’s lecture series is named in honor of the late Wallace Stegner—Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, Stanford University professor and ardent protector of the West’s wild lands and open spaces. Designed to educate and inspire, the lectures explore themes related to land, nature and conservation.
For the past 17 years, Ambassador Bill and Mrs. Jean Lane have generously sponsored POST’s annual lecture series. Support also comes from media sponsor Embarcadero Publishing (Palo Alto Weekly, Mountain View Voice, The Almanac, Palo Alto Online) and lecture sponsors Noble and Lorraine Hancock and Jobst Brandt, Sand Hill Advisors and the Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati Foundation.
The series continues with acclaimed novelist and travel writer Paul Theroux on March 1 and green technology venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, in conversation with KQED radio host Michael Krasny, on April 26. All lectures begin at 8 p.m.
Series subscriptions are available for $325, $175 and $75 per person. For more information about subscribing, call POST at (650) 854-7696, x. 316, or visit us online at www.openspacetrust.org/lectures. Single tickets are $22 and can be ordered directly from the box office at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts at (650) 903-6000 or www.mvcpa.com. All proceeds from the series support POST’s land-saving work.