On Friday, Aug. 4, MacDowell Downtown will feature William Finnegan, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning autobiography “Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life” at Peterborough Town Library, 2 Concord St.

Finnegan has been a contributor to The New Yorker since 1984 and a staff writer since 1987. In the three decades since his first MacDowell Fellowship, Finnegan has reported on racism and conflict in South Africa, politics in Mexico and South America, poverty in the United States and war in Africa and the Balkans. In 2016, the Pulitzer committee described the book as a “memoir of an obsession, a complex enchantment. Surfing only looks like a sport. To initiates, it is something else entirely: a beautiful addiction, a demanding course of study, a morally dangerous pastime, a way of life.”

More than an author’s reading, Finnegan will be joined in conversation by journalist, essayist and Hancock resident Paul Hertneky. Hertneky is perhaps best known for his 2016 memoir, “Rust Belt Boy.” In addition to the art of surfing, their conversation may branch into the fallibility of memory, journalistic mindset in relation to memoir and who gets to tell a given story.

Seating is limited for this free event at the Peterborough Town Library. Doors open at 7 p.m., and the program begins at 7:30 p.m.

David Macy has been MacDowell’s resident director since 1994.