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Sunday, June 23

4:30 PM

KHALED HOSSEINI

AND THE MOUNTAINS ECHOED

in conversation with Frances Dinkelspiel

 

Celebrate with us a master storyteller’s unforgettable novel about finding a lost piece of yourself in someone else.

Khaled Hosseini, the author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, has written a new novel about how we love, how we take care of one another, and how the choices we make resonate through generations. In this tale revolving around not just parents and children but brothers and sisters, cousins and caretakers, Hosseini explores the many ways in which families nurture, wound, betray, honor, and sacrifice for one another; and how often we are surprised by the actions of those closest to us, at the times that matter most. Following its characters and the ramifications of their lives and choices and loves around the globe -- from Kabul to Paris to San Francisco to the Greek island of Tinos – Hosseini’s tale expands gradually outward, becoming more emotionally complex and powerful with each turning page.

Khaled Hosseini was born in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1965. His father was a diplomat in the Afghan Foreign Ministry and his mother taught Farsi and history at a high school in Kabul. In 1976, the Foreign Ministry relocated the Hosseini family to Paris. They were ready to return to Kabul in 1980, but by then their homeland had witnessed a bloody communist coup and the invasion of the Soviet Army. The Hosseinis sought and were granted political asylum in the United States, and in September 1980 moved to San Jose, California. Hosseini graduated from high school in 1984 and enrolled at Santa Clara University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in biology in 1988. The following year he entered the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine, where he earned a medical degree in 1993. He completed his residency at Cedars-Sinai medical center in Los Angeles and was a practicing internist between 1996 and 2004.

In March 2001, while practicing medicine, Hosseini began writing his first novel, The Kite Runner. Published in 2003, that debut went on to become an international bestseller and beloved classic, sold in at least seventy countries and spending more than a hundred weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. In May 2007, his second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, debuted at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list, remaining in that spot for fifteen weeks and nearly an entire year on the bestseller list. Together, the two books have sold more than 10 million copies in the United States and more than 38 million copies worldwide.

In 2006, Hosseini was named a Goodwill Envoy to UNHCR, the United Nations Refugee Agency. Inspired by a trip he made to Afghanistan with the UNHCR, he later established The Khaled Hosseini Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, which provides humanitarian assistance to the people of Afghanistan. He lives in Northern California.

Frances Dinkelspiel, who joins us this afternoon in discussion with Khaled, is the author of the bestselling Towers of Gold: How One Jewish Immigrant Named Isaias Hellman Created California. She is the co-founder of Berkeleyside, an online news site about Berkeley. A former staff reporter for the San Jose Mercury News, her articles have appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, People and elsewhere.

 

Berkeley Arts & Letters at First Congregational Church of Berkeley (2345 Channing Way at Dana; enter via courtyard on Dana)

Map and parking  

Tickets available now at Brown Paper Tickets online or 800-838-3006

One seat and one book, plus early seating $35

Two seats and one book, plus early seating $45

One seat, no book $15

Student (10 – 20; ID will be checked at door), no book $5

Tickets are also available at The Booksmith (1644 Haight Street, San Francisco; 415-863-8688; orders@booksmith.com). Please note: if you want your copy of Khaled's new book before this event, buy your ticket at The Booksmith! Books will be available beginning 5/21 and will be available to pick up or shipped to you.

 

Note: Khaled Hosseini will be signing books after the program for those with a copy of the new book, purchased from us via your ticket or at the event. No outside copies, please. You may also have copies of his previous books signed (and copies of those, too, will be available for purchase at the event) when your new book is signed; there is no limit to the number of copies of the new book you may have signed. Snapshots are welcomed, though we won’t have time for posed photographs.


LATE SUMMER AND INTO FALL ~


Tuesday, August 27
7:30 PM

MARK EPSTEIN

THE TRAUMA OF EVERYDAY LIFE

 

Renowned psychiatrist and author of Thoughts Without a Thinker Mark Epstein uncovers the transformational potential of trauma, revealing how it can be used for the mind’s own development

Trauma does not just happen to a few unlucky people; it is the bedrock of our psychology. Death and illness impact us all, but even the everyday sufferings of loneliness and fear are traumatic.
Western psychology teaches that if we understand the cause of trauma, we might move past it, while many drawn to Eastern practices see meditation as a means of rising above, or distancing themselves from, their most difficult emotions. Both, Epstein argues, fail to recognize that trauma is an indivisible part of life. It takes many forms but spares no one. When we regard trauma with this perspective, understanding that suffering is universal and without logic, our pain connects us to the world on a more fundamental level. The way out is through.

Epstein’s discovery begins in his analysis of the life of Buddha, looking to how the death of his mother informed his path and teachings. The Buddha’s spiritual journey can be read as an expression of primitive agony grounded in childhood trauma. Yet the Buddha’s story is only one of many in The Trauma of Everyday Life. Here, Epstein looks to his own experience, that of his patients’, and of the many fellow sojourners and teachers he encounters as a psychiatrist and Buddhist. They are alike only in that they share in trauma, large and small, as all of us do. Epstein finds throughout that trauma, if it doesn’t destroy us, wakes us up to both our minds’ own capacity and to the suffering of others. It makes us more human, caring, and wise. It can be our greatest teacher, our freedom itself, and it is available to all of us.

Mark Epstein, M.D., is a psychiatrist in private practice in New York City who lectures frequently about the value of Buddhist meditation for psychotherapy. His previous books include Thoughts Without a Thinker, Going to Pieces Without Falling Apart, and Going on Being. He is a contributing editor to Tricycle: The Buddhist Review and has written many articles for Yoga Journal and O: The Oprah Magazine.

 

Berkeley Arts & Letters at the Hillside Club (2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley)

Co-sponsored by the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley

Tickets $12 ($7 students) in advance only, at Brown Paper Tickets online or 800-838-3006; $15 at the door

 

FALL ANNOUNCEMENTS SOON ~

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Directions to the Hillside Club

 

Directions to First Congregational Church of Berkeley

 

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Our gloriously independent bookstore partners are Mrs. Dalloway’s Literary & Garden Arts in Berkeley,
A Great Good Place for Books in Oakland, and The Booksmith in San Francisco.
Featured books are available for purchase at each of our events, and book signing follows each program.

 
 

 Our past speakers include

 

in 2013:
Amy Wilentz / January 24
Sonja Lyubomirsky / January 29
Cecil Williams and Janice Mirikitani / February 22
Po Bronson / March 7
Candida Moss / March 12
Rob Bell / March 18
David Sheff / April 18
Mary Williams and Dave Eggers / April 23
Jim Wallis / May 2
Molly Melching / May 8

in 2012:
Meredith Maran and Terry McMillan /February 22
Eric Alterman / April 19
Diana Butler Bass / May 1
Tim Ryan with Dacher Keltner/ May 2
Bryan Sykes / May 3
Timothy Noah / May 8
Michael Sandel / May 15
Christopher Buckley / June 13
Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot / June 21
Hugh Sinclair with Rose Aguilar / July 24
Geoffrey Nunberg / September 11
Hanna Rosen / September 24
Paul Elie / October 2
Sherman Alexie / October 3
Richard Dawkins / October 11
Camille Paglia / October 24
Tamim Ansary / November 15
Andrew Solomon / November 29

in 2011:
Izzeldin Abuelaish, MD / January 13
Scott McLennan / February 22
Hubert Dreyfus and Sean Kelly / March 9
James Carroll / March 30
Susan Griffin, Karin Lofthus Carrington, Daniel Ellsberg,
George Lakoff, Joan Miura, and Howard Teich / May 12
Eli Pariser / May 18
David Sirota / June 9
Neil Gaiman with Adam Savage / June 27
Robert Bellah / September 14
David Kennedy / October 3
John Lithgow / October 4
Deepak Chopra and Leonard Mlodinow / October 12
Alice Hoffman / October 18
Lawrence Lessig / October 26
Steven Pinker / October 27
Lawrence Weschler and Walter Murch / November 10
Luis Alberto Urrea / December 6

 

 

in 2010:
Chris Farrell / January 21
Jaron Lanier / January 27
Ethan Watters with Todd Oppenheimer / February 4
Garry Wills / February 11
Chris Cleave / February 16
Joel Kotkin / February 18
Mark Vernon and Astra Taylor / March 1
Sam Keen / March 11
Tim O'Brien / March 16
Harry Kreisler / March 24 Christo Tsilokis and Tommy Weiringa with Oscar Villalon / April 21
Roxana Saberi / April 22
Peter Carey / May 5
Dan Ariely / June 3
Nicole Hollander / August 20
Meredith Maran and John McMurtrie / September 22
Elizabeth Rosner and Linda Gray Sexton / September 29
Miriam Pawel, Peter Schrag, Larry Tramutola, and Tom Dalzell / October 7
Robert Scheer / October 14
Houshang Asadi / October 21
Sam Harris / November 13

 

 

in 2009:
William Iggiagruk Nelson / January 14
Dacher Keltner and Michael Lewis /January 21
Dalton Conley / January 27
Luke Bergmann / January 28
Stephen Hinshaw / February 17
David Thomson / February 19
Pratap Chatterjee / February 20
Alva Noe / February 26
Xinran / February 27
Peter Singer / March 2
Stephen Mitchell / March 3
Alan Boss / March 13
Tom Davis and Dennis McNally / March 18
Elaine Showalter / March 19
Germaine Greer / March 31
Paul McGeough / April 7
Mahmood Mamdani / April 10
Judith Orloff / April 15
Michelle Goldberg / April 16
Donald Richie / April 21
Tamim Ansary / May 5
Ruth Reichl / May 10
Reza Aslan / May 12
Colson Whitehead / May 19
Luis Alberto Urrea / June 11
Eduardo Galeano / June 12
Lac Su / June 15  
Novella Carpenter and Michael Pollan /June 18
Scott Rosenberg / July 29
Lang Lang / September 8
Rebecca Solnit / September 17
Michael Sandel / September 23
Robert Scheer  with Peter Richardson / September 24
Max Blumenthal / September 29
Diane Ackerman / September 30
Po Bronson / October 6
Richard Dawkins / October 7
Sherman Alexie / October 8
Stewart Brand / October 16
Leonard Pitt / October 17
Kay Redfield Jamison / October 22
Deepak Chopra / October 23
Gary Vaynerchuk / October 25
Irene Khan / October 29
Orhan Pamuk / November 6
Liza Dalby / November 10
Susan Halpern / November 12
Mary Karr / November 16