New York Times bestselling author Esmé Weijun Wang will share her experience of creating a legacy while living with chronic illness in a free Wisconsin Union Directorate (WUD) Distinguished Lecture Series (DLS) Committee-hosted talk on Monday, April 17 at 7 p.m. in the Concerto and Overture Rooms at Gordon Dining and Event Center.
The event, titled “An Evening with Esmé Weijun Wang – Success Redefined: Breaking the Stigma Around Mental Health,” will include a 60-minute lecture followed by a 30-minute Q&A with Wang, according to a press release from Wisconsin Union. The event is free and open to the public, with no tickets necessary. The lecture will also include CART captioning and American Sign Language interpreters.
“I hope that it helps people living with the schizophrenias to feel less alone, and that it helps people who know and love people living with the schizophrenias to better understand those people,” Wang said about “The Collected Schizophrenias” in an interview with the Association of Writers and Writing Programs. “I hope that it kickstarts conversations about how we treat people, including public policy and general human interaction. I hope that we start to talk about the questions the book brings up, and to ask even more questions still.”
Wang is the recipient of the Graywolf Nonfiction Prize and the Whiting Award for Nonfiction for “The Collected Schizophrenias,” her 2019 essay collection that candidly chronicles her personal experiences with the effects of late-stage Lyme disease and schizoaffective disorder, among other mental health topics.
