Varner Vitality Lecture Series

John Green is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of “Looking for Alaska,” “An Abundance of Katherines,” “Paper Towns,” “The Fault in Our Stars", "Turtles All the Way Down” and “Everything is Tuberculosis.” He is also the coauthor, with David Levithan, of “Will Grayson, Will Grayson.” He was the2006 recipient of the Michael L. Printz Award, a 2009 Edgar Award winner, and has twice been a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Green’s books have been published in more than 55 languages and over 24 million copies are in print. Green's latest book “Everything is Tuberculosis” is an instant #1 New York Times, Washington Post and Indie bestseller. Regarded as a timely and "highly readable call to action" in a starred Kirkus review, the book is a deeply human social and scientific history in which Green illuminates the healthcare inequities that allow this curable, treatable infectious disease to also be the deadliest, killing 1.5 million people every year. In June 2014, the movie adaptation of “The Fault in Our Stars” was released, directed by Josh Boone, produced by Fox 2000 and Temple Hill, and starring Shailene Woodley, Ansel Elgort and Nat Wolff. The screenplay was written by Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber, who went on to adapt “Paper Towns” for film. Fox 2000 and Temple Hill released “Paper Towns” in the summer of 2015, starring Nat Wolff, Cara Delevingne, Justice Smith, Austin Abrams, Halston Sage and Jaz Sinclair. In the second half of 2015, John signed a first look production deal with Fox 2000. The limited series adaptation of “Looking for Alaska” was released on Hulu on October 18, 2019 starring Kristine Froseth, Charlie Plummer and Denny Love. A Netflix adaptation of “Let It Snow” was released on November 8, 2019 starring Isabela Merced, Shameik Moore, Kiernan Shipka, Odeya Rush, Liv Hewson, Joan Cusack, Mitchell Hope and more. In 2007, John and his brother Hank ceased textual communication and began to talk primarily through videoblogs posted to YouTube. The videos spawned a community of people called "nerdfighters" who fight for intellectualism and to decrease the overall worldwide level of suck. (Decreasing suck takes many forms: Nerdfighters have raised millions of dollars to fight poverty in the developing world; they also planted thousands of trees around the world in May of 2010 to celebrate Hank’s 30th birthday.) Although they have long since resumed textual communication, John and Hank continue to upload two videos a week to their YouTube channel, vlogbrothers. Their videos have been viewed more than 800 million times. John and Hank launched educational YouTube channel Crash Course in late 2011 with funding from YouTube’s original channel initiative. John, Hank and a range of other hosts teach humanities and science courses to viewers, with multiple new series launching each year. World History, Literature, Economics, Physics, Biology, Chemistry, and Government are just some of the courses available to date. Crash Course has over 10.7 million subscribers and 1.2 billion views. John and Hank are involved with a myriad of other video projects, including The Art Assignment, Ours Poetica, SciShow, hankgames, Eons and Healthcare Triage. John’s book reviews have appeared in The New York Times Book Review and Booklist, a wonderful book review journal where he worked as a publishing assistant and production editor while writing “Looking for Alaska.” John grew up in Orlando, Florida before attending Indian Springs School and then Kenyon College. He currently lives in Indianapolis with his family.