Dessa Rose

Dessa Rose, a new musical by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty - based on the acclaimed novel of the same name by late UCSD professor of literature Sherley Anne Williams - opens at the Lincoln Center in New York March 21.

Set in the Deep South before the Civil War, Dessa Rose is inspired by the lives of two real women, a pregnant runaway slave and a white woman who harbors runaways on her isolated farm. The story explores the fictional meeting of these two women and the profound effects they have on each other.

Williams, an award-winning African-American poet, playwright, children's book author and literary scholar, joined UCSD in 1973. She taught in the Literature Department, serving as chair from 1977 to 1980, until her death in 1999 at the age of 54.

Dessa Rose plays in the Lincoln Center's Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater through May 29.

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