Journalist, author Basbanes headlines Library Friends lecture

Nicholas Basbanes, an award-winning journalist and author, will be the featured speaker at this year’s Friends of the University of Wisconsin–Madison Libraries annual lecture. His lecture at 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 20, will be held at the Madison Club, 5 East Wilson St.

Basbanes has been called a “certified bibliomaniac” and “the leading authority on books about books.” Now in its eighth edition with more than 80,000 copies in print, his first book, A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in nonfiction for 1995. It was also named a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Basbanes’ most recent book is A Splendor of Letters: The Permanence of Books in an Impermanent World.

A former literary editor of the Worcester Sunday Telegram, Basbanes currently writes a monthly review of children’s books for Literary Features Syndicate, which he and his wife established in 1993.

For more information on the lecture, which is open to the public at no charge, or on the Friends of the UW–Madison Libraries, call the Friends at 608-265-2505 or visit http://giving.library.wisc.edu.