Lorene Cary, activist and author of “Pride,” “The Price of a Child” and “Black Ice,” will speak on Thursday, Sept. 29, at 7:30 p.m. in the Nott Memorial. Her talk, part of the College's Perspectives at the Nott speaker series, is free and open to the public.
“Black Ice,” Cary's first book, is a memoir of her years as the first black female student and then teacher at St. Paul's, an exclusive New England boarding school. She writes about issues such as race, the lives of women, education, and growing up. The book was dubbed “… probably the most beautifully written and moving African-American autobiographical narrative since Maya Angelou's Celebrated 'I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.'
Cary has been a contributing editor at Newsweek, and associate editor at TV Guide. Her essays and articles have appeared in the New York Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, American Visions, Essence and Philadelphia magazine. She lectures in creative writing at her alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, where she received the Provost's Award for Distinguished Teaching.
She is the founder of Art Sanctuary, a nonprofit program for African American arts and culture in North Philadelphia.