Doris Kearns Goodwin
OXFORD, Miss. – Pulitzer Prize-winning author Doris Kearns Goodwin is the keynote speaker for the Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College‘s fall convocation Thursday (September 12) at the University of Mississippi.
The annual event, which begins at 7:30 p.m. in the Gertrude C. Ford Center for the Performing Arts, is free and open to the public. Tickets are not required, and a reception follows the event.
“Doris Kearns Goodwin goes after the tough questions of the day: what makes a leader and how shall one lead in a time of dissent and turmoil,” said Douglass Sullivan-Gonzaléz, dean of the Honors College.
“She brings a wealth of experience in exploring these questions in the heart of American history, and sheds light not only on those events that shaped leaders such as Lincoln and FDR, but looks at the leaps of faith inherent in their convictions that pushed the country from the edge of abyss toward a more holistic experience of liberty. We are privileged to enjoy the words of a Pulitzer Prize-winning author at the SMBHC Fall Convocation.”
A renowned presidential historian and public speaker, Goodwin received critical acclaim for her seventh book, “Leadership in Turbulent Times” (Simon and Schuster), published last year. The New York Times bestseller is a culmination of Goodwin’s five-decade career of studying the American presidents.
A native of Brooklyn, New York, Goodwin earned her bachelor’s and doctoral degrees from Colby College and Harvard University. She has written biographies of several U.S. presidents, including “Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream,” “The Fitzgeralds and the Kennedys: An American Saga,” “Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln” and “The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism.”
Goodwin’s book, “No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II,” won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1995.
She also has played herself as a teacher on “The Simpsons” and a historian on “American Horror Story.” She was the first woman to enter the Boston Red Sox locker room in 1979 and is a devoted fan of the World Series-winning team.
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