This year’s Mississippi University for Women’s Welty Gala will feature best-selling author and political satirist P.J. O’Rourke.
O’Rourke, who was called “the funniest writer in America” by both Time and The Wall Street Journal, will speak at the gala on Oct. 23 at 7 p.m. in the Mary Ellen Weathersby Pope Banquet Room on MUW’s campus.
The Welty Gala is part of the Welty Series, which MUW holds every October in honor of the university’s world-renowned alumna, writer Eudora Welty.
The university will also host the Eudora Welty Writers’ Symposium Oct. 22-24.
“The Welty Gala is an important event to raise scholarships for well-deserved students,” MUW President Jim Borsig said. “Also, it is an opportunity for the community and the area to experience well-known speakers.”
Prior to the dinner at the gala, guests are invited to a reception where they can chat with the authors who participate in the Welty Symposium.
O’Rourke has written 16 books, including “Holidays in Heck,” “Eat the Rich,” “Republican Party Reptile” and “Don’t Vote — It Just Encourages the Bastards.” His latest book, “The Baby Boom: How It Got That Way … And It Wasn’t My Fault … And I’ll Never Do It Again,” is on sale now.
He has worked for small newspapers in Baltimore and New York, as well as publications like The Wall Street Journal, World Affairs, Car and Driver, Town & County, Forbes, The Atlantic and Rolling Stone, where he was chief of the foreign affairs desk for 15 years. During the 1980’s, he covered crises and conflicts across the world.
O’Rourke is currently the H.L. Mencken Research Fellow at the Cato Institute in Washington D.C. and frequently appears as a panelist on National Public Radio’s game show “Wait Wait … Don’t Tell Me!” He also writes a weekly column at the Daily Beast titled “Up To a Point…,” in which he gives his take on current events, from politics to pop culture.
Tickets to the gala are sold at different levels and can be ordered online at muw.edu/welty/gala. For more information, call the MUW Office of Development and Alumni at 662-329-7148 or email [email protected].
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