Follow the Yellow Brick Road to Fresno

The Arne Nixon Center and The International Wizard of Oz Club invite everyone to a national Oz conference, “Oz: The Books,” May 14-16, 2010, on the Fresno State campus.

Featured speakers will include Gregory Maguire, author of Wicked; Michael Patrick Hearn, author of The Annotated Wizard of Oz; John Fricke, co-author of The Wizard of Oz: An Illustrated Companion to the Timeless Movie Classic; Kathleen Krull, author of The Road to Oz: Twists, Bumps, and Triumphs in the Life of L. Frank Baum; and graphic novelist Eric Shanower, author/artist of Adventures in Oz.

The conference will feature a musical, “Time Again in Oz,” produced by the Fresno State Theatre Arts Department and directed by J. Daniel Herring. Playwright Suzan L. Zeder, who based this play on the third Oz book, Ozma of Oz, will also be a speaker.

ANCA, the Arne Nixon Center Advocates, will sponsor the conference reception. The Fresno Metropolitan Museum of Art, History, and Science will offer a special Ozzy exhibition. Other community sponsors include Fresno Pacific University and The Fresno County Public Library. Planning is still underway; some projects are dependant on the future generosity of donors. As plans progress, information will be posted on the Center’s Web site at www.arnenixoncenter.org. The Center’s phone number is (559) 278-8116.