Glenna Lang is the author of Genius of Common Sense: The Story of Jane Jacobs and “The Death and Life of Great American Cities,” a book for young adults of all ages, which was chosen as a 2009 Notable Book by both the New York Times and Smithsonian magazine. That same year, in collaboration with the Cambridge Historical Commission, she started an annual Jane Jacobs’s Walk, which has become a highlight of early May with the ever-growing participation of enthusiastic residents. In 2011, Glenna lectured at the dedication of Jane Jacobs’s childhood home in Scranton, Pennsylvania, which catapulted her into more research on Jane Jacobs, leading to her forthcoming book on Jacobs, tentatively titled Jane Jacobs’s First City: Learning from Scranton.

Glenna teaches illustration and design at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where she seeks to engage students in projects for nonprofit organizations and other good causes. She graduated from the University of Chicago, where she loved gazing at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House from her dormitory window and was shocked to learn of the routine destruction of Chicago’s other architectural gems. Although she mainly grew up in New York City (in the Jackson Heights neighborhood of Queens), she has spent most of her life in Boston and Cambridge, Massachusetts, whose urban environment has inspired her art. Her illustrations have appeared frequently in the Atlantic Monthly, the Boston Globe, and many other publications. She has written and illustrated five picture books for children, including the American Library Association’s prize-winner Looking Out for Sarah, depicting a day in the life of a seeing-eye dog and his owner from the dog’s point of view.