Join the Hubbell Environmental Law Initiative and Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer and journalist Elizabeth Kolbert for a conversation on climate change, biodiversity loss, and the role of journalism in shaping public understanding of environmental issues during a public event at Voxman Music Building on Saturday, April 11. The event begins with a free public reception at 6:00 pm in the Pearl Lobby of the Voxman. The program begins at 7:00 pm in the Concert Hall, and the event ends a book signing immediately following the program. Prairie Lights will be selling Elizabeth Kolbert's newest book during the reception.

Details:

• Saturday, April 11, 2026

• 6 p.m., public reception

• 7 p.m., program followed by book signing

• Voxman Music Building Concert Hall

Kolbert's latest book, Life on a Little Known Planet, was named a Best Book of the Year by The New Yorker and is a collection of urgent, thought-provoking essays exploring the climate crisis and the natural world. It chronicles her travels to endangered locations—from melting Greenland ice sheets to carbon-neutral Danish islands—and highlights scientists attempting to save species.

This discussion will be moderated by Erin Jordan, associate professor of practice in the UI School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

Registration is required in advance of this event. Register by filling out this form: https://uiowa.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_8CTF8mzcCQy14H4

Elizabeth Kolbert is the author of Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature, and Climate Change and The Sixth Extinction, for which she won the Pulitzer Prize. For her work at The New Yorker, where she's a staff writer, she has received two National Magazine Awards and the Blake-Dodd Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Her book Under a White Sky has been shortlisted for the Wainwright Prize for Writing on Global Conservation. Kolbert lives in Williamstown, Massachusetts, with her husband and children.

This event is co-sponsored by HELI, Prairie Lights Bookstore, the UI School of Journalism and Mass Communication.