Opera ‘Buffet’ at U-Mary Thursday

Four local female authors will give talks and read selections at the free “Women’s Voices” event at 7 p.m. Tuesday in Dickinson State University’s Beck Auditorium.

Margaret Barnhart, a DSU English lecturer, whose work was featured in an anthology, will read a selection about growing up and working in a small rural community. Kathleen Hanna, a DSU English instructor, will discuss her novel “No covenants Unkept,” the story of a politically conservative, religious family as they raise a son who is determined to become a woman. Brenda Nottestad is a DSU student and the author of “The Distorted Mirror,” a journal of reflections on her daughter’s eating disorder. Mickey Renner is a librarian at Dickinson Public High School whose book, “Sidewalk Thoughts,” chronicles her thoughts as Renner at age 50 walked Dickinson’s streets trying to get in shape.

The event is In honor of Women’s History Month. A reception follows.

“Blithe Spirit,” a tale of ghostly proportions by playwright Noel Coward, opens at 8 p.m. Wednesday at Dakota Stage Ltd., 412 E. Main Ave.

Coward’s fictional tale tells of novelist Charles Condomine’s plight after he invites into his placid country home an eccentric, breezy lady medium. A seance ends up summoning back Condomine’s dead first wife. The woman from beyond, still mischievous, appears and torments Condomine, who is married to another woman, now, by reminding him of their days and nights together. The first wife has a ghostly plot in mind: If she can get Condomine into an automobile accident and make a ghost of him, life in the spirit world will have more appeal for her.

Mistakes occur, however, and it is the current wife, Ruth, who takes the fatal automobile ride and dies only to return with the first wife to plague the utterly bewildered astral bigamist.

Shows are set for 8 p.m. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday and at 2 p.m. on Sunday.

Tickets are $15 for adults and $12 for seniors and students.

For more information, call 258-4998.

Singers fromUniversity of Mary will perform selections from several operas including “Die Fledermaus,”"Cosi Fan Tutte” and “Madama Butterfly” at 7 p.m. Thursday at the campus’ R.M. Heskett Hall in the Clairmont Center for Performing Arts.

The free performance will include a variety of opera scenes, ranging from moments of merriment to masquerade to madness.

The performers will be Ambria Brantner, Jacquelyn Campbell, Claire Hoselton, Joseph McCauley, Melissa Rooke, Mary and Emily Salveson, Daniel Sivak, Zach Thompson and Chandra Turner.

For more information, call 355-8301.

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