Finding Forward

McCann is the author of seven novels and three collections of short stories. Born and raised in Dublin, Ireland, he has been the recipient of many international honors, including the U.S National Book Award, the International Dublin Literary Prize, a Chevalier des Arts et Lettres from the French government, election to the Irish arts academy, several European awards, the 2010 Best Foreign Novel Award in China, and an Oscar nomination. In 2017, he was elected to the American Academy of Arts. His work has been published in over 40 languages. He is the President and co-founder of the non-profit global story exchange organization, Narrative 4. He is the Thomas Hunter Writer in Residence in Hunter College, in New York, where he lives with his wife Allison and their family. When it was released, Apeirogon, became an immediate New York Times best-seller and won several major international awards.

Apeirogon is a unique exploration of the complexities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The book is named after a shape with a countably infinite number of sides, reflecting the myriad perspectives and stories within this conflict. At its core, the novel is centered around the true stories of two fathers—one Israeli and one Palestinian—whose daughters were killed in the conflict.

St. Thomas held a webinar earlier this year with those two fathers—Rami Elhanan, an Israeli graphic designer, and Bassam Aramin, a Palestinian scholar. In Aperiogon, McCann weaves together their personal stories with an array of historical, cultural, and political fragments, ranging from bird migrations to the history of the region, in a story that illuminates the humanity beyond the divisive political realities that still threaten to tear us apart. Through its innovative structure and lyrical prose, Apeirogon challenges readers to transcend the divisive rhetoric, emphasizing empathy, understanding, and the potential for reconciliation without losing sight of the need for justice for the Palestinian people, a secure homeland for Jewish people, and the possibility of hope, even still. (Steven Spielberg has purchased the movie rights and is in the early stages of adapting it.)

Rob Vischer was named the 16th President of the University of St. Thomas on January 1, 2023, after acting as interim president for the previous seven months, beginning in June 2022. He was inaugurated on May 12, 2023.

In nearly 10 years as dean of the St. Thomas School of Law, Vischer has helped leverage the law school's mission to achieve critical objectives in student success and community impact. Over the course of his deanship, the law school has dramatically improved employment outcomes for its graduates, built a global student body by establishing partnerships with law schools in more than a dozen countries, redoubled its commitment to whole-person professional formation, maintained its top-25 ranking for scholarly impact, and made racial justice core to its mission. The Harvard Law School graduate was an inaugural recipient of the Minnesota Lawyer Diversity and Inclusion Award for his contributions to the advancement of diversity and inclusion in the practice of law.

Before entering the legal academy, Vischer was associated with Kirkland & Ellis in Chicago, where he practiced corporate litigation. He clerked for three federal judges: Judge David Ebel of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Joan Gottschall of the Northern District of Illinois, and Judge John Wiese of the Court of Federal Claims. He received his B.A. degree, summa cum laude, from the University of New Orleans, and his J.D., cum laude, from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.