ITHACA, N.Y. -- Nature writer Terry Tempest Williams, author of Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place , considered a classic of environmental literature, will present a public lecture at Cornell, Tuesday, March 26.

Titled "Homework: The Art of Sustainability," Williams' talk will be in Auditorium D of Goldwin Smith Hall on campus beginning at 7:30 p.m. It is free and open to the public, and no tickets are needed.

A naturalist and environmental activist, Williams grew up near the Great Salt Lake and is the sixth generation of a Mormon family. She is the author of Pieces of White Shell: Coyote's Canyon , An Unspoken Hunge , Desert Quartet ,Leap and, most recently, Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert .

Williams has been recognized in the Utne Reader as a "visionary" and one of the Utne 100 "who could change your life." Her work has appeared in The New Yorker , The Nation , Outside , Audubon , Parabola , The Iowa Review and Best American Essays . She has been a fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and the Lannan Foundation in creative nonfiction, a recipient of the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Award, the National Wildlife Federation's National Conservation Award for Special Achievement, and she was placed on the Rachel Carson Institute's "honor roll." She is the Shirley Sutton Thomas Visiting Professor of English at the University of Utah and lives with her husband, Brooke Williams, in Grand County, Utah.

Her lecture is sponsored at Cornell by: Professor Eloy Rodriguez, director of the Cornell Biodiversity Laboratory; the Science Organization for Latinos; the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Minority Programs and Academic Programs at Cornell; Cornell Undergraduate Research Program in Biodiversity; the Office of the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences; the Society for the Humanities; the Office of the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Affairs; the Center for the Environment; the Women's Studies Program; CRESP (Center for Religion, Ethics and Social Policy); BCERF (Breast Cancer and Environmental Risk Factors) program; and the Department of English Program in Creative Writing.

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