When a Florida school responded to a single parent’s complaint about the inaugural poem The Hill We Climb by removing access for the youngest students, Amanda Gorman was compelled to speak. She said she was “gutted” that the poem, heard by 40 million at the inauguration of President Biden, was subject to such a removal, and called for her nearly 4 million Instagram followers to donate to PEN America. In a follow-up on Twitter, she said, “history is not ours to hoard from children. History has always been theirs to make. And the more they're empowered to know our yesterdays, the more prepared they will be to lead us into tomorrow.”
The highlight of our 2023 Literary Gala was welcoming back Salman Rushdie in-person back into our community after a near-fatal stabbing that he endured last summer. Rushdie was honored along with Saturday Night Live’sLorne Michaels and imprisoned Iranian writer Narges Mohammadi. Accepting the PEN Centenary Courage Award, Rushdie thanked those who rushed to his rescue after the attack: “The courage that day was all theirs.”
May was a prolific month for new educational gag orders, with three new laws adopted and several more appearing imminent. Jeremy C. Young and Jeffrey Sachs found that so-called “DEI ban” bills go far beyond banning DEI initiatives to enable the partisan takeover of many aspects of university governance. Read the report >>
PEN UNITES
HOW TO BE AN ALLY WHEN YOU WITNESS ONLINE ABUSE
Monday, June 12, 2023 | 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm ET
Virtual Event
In this free, one-hour, interactive training, we’ll give you the tools you need to intervene safely and effectively in online abuse using Right To Be’s 5Ds of bystander intervention.
Opening Tomorrow! PEN America Literary Award Submissions
Starting tomorrow, submissions are open for the PEN America Literary Awards for books published in 2023. With the help of our partners, PEN America confers more than 20 distinct awards, fellowships, grants and prizes each year, awarding nearly $350,000 to writers and translators.
PEN America member Mindy Aloff takes her readers on a journey through various forms of dance—rituals, religious observances, storytelling, musical interpretations—to show why dance matters to human beings in Why Dance Matters. Interlaced with personal experiences, this book builds on analysis to reveal the intimate relationship we have with dance—personal, spiritual, soul-searching, medicinal, and entertaining.
Salman Rushdie’s appearance at the gala made international headlines, including this piece in The New York Times.
Suzanne Nossel spoke about the lawsuit against Escambia County and another school’s decision to restrict Amanda Gorman’s inaugural poem,The Hill We Climb, on All In with Chris Hayes, Morning Joe,and The Reidout.
Kasey Meehan spoke to the BBC about the escalation of book bans in the United States.
Jonathan Friedman discussed how the history of authoritarianism can teach us about today’s censorship efforts in LGBTQ Nation.
Shannon Jankowski wrote about a new Twitter policy that will make it even harder for journalists to root out disinformation in The Hill.
Jeremy Young was interviewed on All Sides with Ann Fisherabout how diversity training restrictions are contributing to educational censorship on college campuses.
‘You will be killed’: Iran’s female journalists speak out on brutal crackdown (Guardian)
Burhan Sönmez, president of PEN International, discusses the tension between politics and art and the role of literature in authoritarian societies. (The New York Times)
Florida library threatened by GOP lawmaker over its 'I read banned books' cards (Raw Story)
Cook County jail’s paper ban infringes on intellectual freedom of detainees (Chicago Sun-Times)
“Terrorism must not terrorize us. Violence must not deter us. As the old Marxists used to say, La lutte continue. La lutta continua. The struggle goes on.”
- Salman Rushdie at PEN America Literary Gala
TRENDING @ PENAMERICA
Students Stage Public Reading of Amanda Gorman Poem
Students at New Road School — the California elementary school Amanda Gorman attended — read The Hill We Climb after it was removed from elementary school shelves at a school in Miami-Dade County.
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