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T U E S D A Y

In the year 2095, what sort of 20th-century belles lettres will academics study? The interoffice memos of Graydon Carter? The complete e-mails of Bill Gates? Or perhaps the unabridged voice mail messages of Camille Paglia? Postmodern society has left too many time capsules. But in her Selected Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, American University literature professor Betty T. Bennett reconstructs Shelley’s 19th century, when ambitions ran high but media access was, perhaps fortunately, limited. Bennett discusses her work at 8 p.m. at the Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden’s Ring Auditorium, 7th & Independence Ave. SW. $13. (202) 357-3030. (NodB)