Esther Freier Lecture

We look forward to seeing you at our next free event at the University of Minnesota campus, as the author series that began in 2001 continues to explore literature and the humanities. In 2026, the Freier Lectures series celebrates its 25th anniversary!

Fall 2026 Freier Lecture

An Evening with George Saunders

September 22, Northrop Carlson Family Stage

The Esther Freier Lectures in Literature Series presents the bestselling author of the Man Booker Prize-winning Lincoln in the Bardo (2017) reading from his new novel Vigil. Professor Julie Schumacher will moderate a conversation with Saunders in this special event celebrating 25 years of the Freier series.

This in-person event is free with registration, which will open in June. Live captioning and ASL provided. For further questions about accessibility services and the venue, please email [email protected] or call 612-626-1528. Presented by the Department of English.

The recipient of a 2006 MacArthur Foundation Fellowship (“Genius” Award), George Saunders has authored two novels, four collections of short stories, a novella, a book of essays, and an award-winning children’s book. His 2026 novel Vigil (Random House) takes place at the bedside of an oil company CEO, in the twilight hours of his life, as he is ferried from this world into the next; it has been praised as “a wise, playful, electric novel.”

Saunders's first novel, Lincoln in the Bardo (2017), won the Man Booker Prize and was a #1 New York Times bestseller. His most recent story collection, Liberation Day (2022), was also a New York Times bestseller. His collection Tenth of December was the winner of the 2014 Story Prize and the 2014 Folio Prize. His work appears regularly in The New Yorker, GQ, and Harpers Magazine, and has appeared in the O’Henry, Best American Short Story, Best Non-Required Reading, and Best American Travel Writing anthologies. Saunders is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, was named one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World by TIME Magazine in 2013, and received the 2025 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters (DCAL) from the National Book Foundation. He teaches in the Creative Writing Program at Syracuse University.

More author readings are offered through our creative writing program's Edelstein-Keller Visiting Writer Series.

About Esther Freier

The Esther Freier literature series hosts two free lectures each year featuring various prize-winning authors. The literary legacy that Esther Freier envisioned began in 2001, when celebrated novelist and essayist Jamaica Kincaid inaugurated the Esther Freier Endowed Lecture in Literature series. A clinical laboratory chemist and professor, Freier had a deep and profound love for literature and the humanities. She wanted to leave a legacy that would benefit the public and inspire emerging authors. In her will, Freier created an endowment that would bring prize-winning national and international authors to campus for free, public lectures and informal visits with students.

Esther Freier was born in Hibbing, Minnesota, in 1925. She moved to Minneapolis while still a child and spent her entire academic (BS ‘46, MS ‘56) and professional career of 45 years at the University of Minnesota. She co-authored the first paper dealing with quality control in clinical chemistry, winning several awards. When she retired in 1991, she held the only endowed professorship in medical technology in the nation. That year, Freier served as the first woman president of the Academy of Clinical and Laboratory Physicians and Scientists and was re-elected the following year. Esther Freier was a teacher, friend, and mentor to many. The Department of English is deeply grateful for her generosity to us, the University, and the community.

Previous Freier Lecturers

April 14, 2026: Attica Locke & Celeste Ng
October 23, 2025: Ocean Vuong
April 10, 2025: R. F. Kuang
October 9, 2024: Hernan Diaz
April 24, 2024: Ross Gay & Aimee Nezhukumatathil
October 26, 2023: Jesmyn Ward
April 18, 2023: N. K. Jemisin
October 19, 2022: Joy Harjo & Layli Long Soldier
April 13, 2022: Jennifer Egan
March 24, 2021: Helen Oyeyemi
October 7, 2020: Alison Bechdel
October 23, 2019: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
October 4, 2018: Frank Bidart & Maggie Nelson
April 4, 2018: Young People's Lit Panel with M. T. Anderson, Kate DiCamillo, David Barclay Moore, and Nicola Yoon
October 25, 2017: Edwidge Danticat
April 13, 2017: Andrew Solomon
October, 2016: Claudia Rankine & Marilynne Robinson
April, 2016: Abraham Verghese
October, 2015: Jeanette Winterson
February, 2015: Lynn Nottage
October, 2014: James McBride
April, 2014: David Mitchell
October, 2013: Katherine Boo
April, 2013: Colum McCann
October, 2012: Zadie Smith
April, 2012: Denis Johnson
October, 2011: Philip Gourevitch
April, 2011: Natasha Trethewey
October, 2010: James Salter
April, 2010: Richard Powers
September, 2009: Maxine Hong Kingston
March, 2009: Louise Glück
October, 2008: Junot Díaz
March, 2006: Suzan-Lori Parks
November, 2007: Paul Muldoon
April, 2007: E. L. Doctorow
November, 2006: Bharati Mukherjee
April, 2006: T. C. Boyle
October, 2005: Philip Levine
April, 2005: Anna Deavere Smith
November, 2004: Rita Dove
April, 2004: A. S. Byatt
October, 2003: Arnold Rampersad
February, 2003: Michael Chabon
November, 2002: Edmund White
March, 2002: Barry Lopez
March, 2001: W. S. Merwin
February, 2001: Jamaica Kincaid