Roald Hoffmann, winner of the 1981 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, is in residency in Knoxville for two free public events on Friday and Saturday, Feb. 22-23. His visit to UT will be only one of 14 he has planned for the year, with other trips ranging from New Zealand to Spain.

Hoffmann, who is also a published poet and playwright, will present a lecture titled "One Culture or the Commonalities and Differences Between the Arts and the Science" on Friday, Feb. 22 at 3:30 p.m. in the Lindsay Young Auditorium at Hodges Library. The lecture explores the alleged rift between scientists and humanists. Using examples from chemistry and poetry, Hoffmann makes a case for unity between the two groups.

A stage reading of Hoffmann's play "Should've" will take place at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 23, at the Black Box Theater, 5213 Homberg Drive. The play begins with the suicide of Friedrich Wertheim, a German chemist, who felt responsible for giving terrorists knowledge on how to make a neurotoxin.

Hoffmann, 70, is the Frank H.T. Rhodes Professor of Humane Letters at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y, where he currently teaches. He helped bring science to a broader audience when his TV series "The World of Chemistry," debuted in 1990.

He is also the author of many books, some of which are: "Chemistry Imagined," "The Same and Not the Same Old Wine," and "New Flasks: Reflections on Science and Jewish Tradition."