Thomas Friedman

Thomas Friedman PIC CREDIT Josh Haner and The New York Times

WRITERS AND READERS WEEK, Friday 9 – Wednesday 14 March 2012

THOMAS FRIEDMAN: WRITERS AND READERS WEEK CLOSING ADDRESS

“In China today, Bill Gates is Britney Spears. In America today, Britney Spears is Britney Spears – and that is our problem.” Thomas Friedman

Three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and best-selling author Thomas Friedman will give a keynote address at the Wellington Town Hall to close the New Zealand International Arts Festival’s Writers and Readers Week.

Foreign affairs columnist for The New York Times since 1995, Friedman has been described as one of the world’s most influential public intellectuals. His work on globalisation, The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century, has sold more than four million copies in 37 languages. Other titles include From Beirut to Jerusalem, The Lexus and the Olive Tree, Longitudes and Attitudes: Exploring the World After September 11 and Hot, Flat, and Crowded.

Friedman is an outspoken commentator on global affairs, with a unique ability to focus on the social, economic, political and environmental trends shaping our world.

In his latest book, co-written with Michael Mandelbaum, That Used To Be Us, Friedman examines four major challenges facing America today – globalisation, the revolution in information technology, the nation’s chronic deficits, and its pattern of energy consumption. That Used To Be Us has been described as both a searching exploration of the American condition today and a rousing manifesto for American renewal.

Friedman’s career with The New York Times includes postings in Beirut and Jerusalem at flashpoints in those countries’ histories. He was also the paper’s chief White House correspondent during the first year of the Clinton Administration.

Thomas Friedman has been awarded the John F. Kennedy Memorial Fellowship, established by the New Zealand Government in 1963 for the purpose of bringing eminent Americans to New Zealand and administered by Fulbright New Zealand.

WHEN: 6pm Wednesday 14 March 2012

WHERE: Wellington Town Hall

DURATION: 1 hr

TICKETS: $33/ Bookmark Pass & Friends $28

ENDS

Writers and Readers Week is supported by the Lion Foundation, Victoria University of Wellington, John F. Kennedy Memorial Fellowship, Unity Books, Museum Art Hotel, Australia Council for the Arts, Australian High Commission, Goethe Institut, Canada Council for the Arts, Embassy of Spain and the Embassy of the United States of America.