KU chancellor to speak on Zora Neale Hurston at KC Art Institute Tuesday

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- University of Kansas Chancellor Robert Hemenway will speak Tuesday on African-American novelist Zora Neale Hurston at a Kansas City Art Institute speakers series to commemorate Black History Month.

The chancellor will speak at noon in the Vanderslice Reception Room at the institute, 4415 Warwick Blvd. in Kansas City, Mo. The lecture is open to the public and media.

Hemenway's 1977 book, "Zora Neale Hurston: A Literary Biography," was a "Best Books" pick by the New York Times in 1978 and a Quality Paperback Book Club selection in 1991. Hurston (1891-1960) was an anthropologist who was regarded as the foremother of the study of African-American culture.

Other speakers in the art institute's monthlong series include Kansas City art educator Leonard Pryor, who in 1948 became the institute's first African-American graduate, and Kansas City Mayor Pro Tem Alvin Brooks.

Next month, the chancellor and Valerie Boyd, author of "Wrapped in Rainbows," the first new biography of Hurston in 25 years, will open Women's History Month at KU with a "Conversation about Zora Neale Hurston" at 3:30 p.m. Monday, March 3, in the Malott Room of the Kansas Union.

Hemenway, who helped inspire Boyd to write the biography, will talk about the resurgence of interest in Hurston. Film rights for Hurston's novel "Their Eyes Were Watching God" have been sold to "Oprah Presents"/ABC. Last summer more than 2,000 people attended a party to honor Hurston in New York's Central Park.