Mary Calvi at Harvard Book Store

presenting

If a Poem Could Live and Breathe:
A Novel of Teddy Roosevelt's First Love

in conversation with PAULA EBBEN

Date

Feb
16
Thursday
February 16, 2023
7:00 PM ET

Location

Harvard Book Store
1256 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA 02138

Tickets

This event is free; no tickets are required.

Harvard Book Store welcomes MARY CALVI—12-time New York Emmy award-winning journalist and anchor—for a discussion of her new book If a Poem Could Live and Breathe: A Novel of Teddy Roosevelt's First Love. She will be joined in conversation by PAULA EBBEN—Peabody award-winning anchor for WBZ-TV.

A Return to In-Person Events

Harvard Book Store is excited to be back to in-person programming. To ensure the safety and comfort of everyone in attendance, the following Covid-19 safety protocols will be in place at all of our Harvard Book Store events until further notice:

  • Face coverings are required of all staff and attendees when inside the store. Masks must snugly cover nose and mouth.

About If a Poem Could Live and Breathe

Studded with the real love letters between a young Theodore Roosevelt and Boston beauty Alice Lee―many of them never before published―If a Poem Could Live and Breathe makes vivid what many historians believe to be the pivotal years that made the future president into the man of action that defined his political life, and cemented his legacy.

Cambridge, 1878. The era of the Gilded Age. Alice Lee sets out to break from the norms of her mother’s generation. Women are fighting for educational opportunities and exploring a new sense of intellectual and personal freedom. Native New Yorker, Harvard student Teddy Roosevelt, is on his own journey of discovery, and when they meet, unrelenting currents of love change the trajectory of his life forever.

If a Poem Could Live and Breathe is an indelible portrait of the authenticity of first love, the heartache of loss, and how overcoming the worst of life’s obstacles can push one to greatness never imagined.

Mary Calvi
Mary Calvi

Mary Calvi

Mary Calvi is a 12-time New York Emmy award-winning journalist and national anchor. Her in-depth research for her debut book, Dear George, Dear Mary: A Novel of George Washington's First Love, is the basis of a Smithsonian Channel documentary. Calvi lives in Yonkers, New York.

Photo Credit: Joe Panella

Paula Ebben
Paula Ebben

Paula Ebben

Multiple award-winning journalist Paula Ebben co-anchors WBZ-TV Newscasts at Noon and 5:30 p.m. Ebben received a 2014 Columbia DuPont Award and a 2013 Peabody Award as part of WBZ-TV's team coverage of the Boston Marathon Bombings. She has been nominated for multiple Boston/New England Emmy Awards for Anchor, Reporter, Consumer Reporter, Education Series and for Writing, and won for Reporter in a WBZ Special on the Merrimack Valley Gas Explosions. In 2005, Ebben was awarded a regional RTNDA Edward R. Murrow Award for Best Feature Reporting. In 2011, she was chosen to report for all CBS stations from The 2011 Royal Wedding in London, England. Ebben and her husband Bill reside in the Greater Boston area. They have four children.

Harvard Book Store
1256 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA 02138

Walking from the Harvard Square T station: 2 minutes

As you exit the station, reverse your direction and walk east along Mass. Ave. in front of the Cambridge Savings Bank. Cross Dunster St. and proceed along Mass. Ave for three more blocks. You will pass Au Bon Pain, JP Licks, and TD Bank. Harvard Book Store is located at the corner of Mass. Ave. and Plympton St.

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