Students, staff, faculty, alumni, and any members of the public are all invited to the Fall 2015-Spring 2016 series of Faculty Pub Night at LMU's William H. Hannon Library. Eight LMU professors (four per semester) are selected annually to discuss their latest publication or project in a comfortable setting and format that welcomes diverse perspectives for an inclusive conversation aimed to educate the entire community.

The fourth and final Faculty Pub Night of Spring 2017 features Holli Levitsky, Professor of English and Director of Jewish Studies at LMU's Bellarmine College of Liberal Arts. Professor Levitsky will discuss her recent publication, Summer Haven: The Catskills, the Holocaust, and the Literary Imagination.

About the Author's Work:

This volume provides for the first time a collection of writing that investigates the stories and struggles of survivors in the context of the Jewish resort culture of the Catskills, through new and existing works of fiction and memoir by writers who spent their youths there. It explores how vacationers, resort owners, and workers dealt with a horrific contradiction--the pleasure of their summer haven against the mass extermination of Jews throughout Europe. It also examines the character of Holocaust survivors in the Catskills: in what ways did the people find connection, resolution to conflict, and avenues to come together despite the experiences that set them apart?

 About the Author & Her Work:

Holli Levitsky is the founder and Director of the Jewish Studies Program and Professor of English at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. Her research, scholarship and teaching focuses on Jewish American and Holocaust literatures. She is the author of Summer Haven: The Catskills, the Holocaust and the Literary Imagination, The Literature of Exile and Displacement: American Identity in a Time of Crisis,  and numerous articles, book chapters and reviews. Since holding the 2001-2002 Fulbright Distinguished Chair in American Literature in Poland, Dr. Levitsky  has participated in symposia, conferences, and study trips to Germany and to Poland to advance German-Jewish and Polish-Jewish understanding. She regularly leads workshops for secondary and college teachers in California and in Poland on teaching the Holocaust

All Faculty Pub Nights are free and open to the public. Pub refreshments and snacks will be served courtesy of the William H. Hannon Library. For more information or ADA accommodations, please contact Ray Andrade, Programming Librarian, at (310) 258-4648 or randrade@lmu.edu.