We track book bans all year, but we are thrilled when Banned Books Week comes around and we can rally so many partners and allies to the cause. This year, we’re extending the usual week into a month with some exciting surprises up our sleeves. Our experts are fanning out across the country for events drawing attention to the book ban crisis in our schools and libraries. Join us for one of more than 20 events throughout October, with talks featuring Brad Meltzer and Camryn Garrett in Miami; Casey McQuiston and Cheryl Willis Hudson in Brooklyn; Carmen Maria Machado in Salt Lake City; Elana K. Arnold and Dr. Eric Cervini in Los Angeles, and many more.
Our CEO Suzanne Nossel participated in the keynote conversation with Salman Rushdie at the National Constitution Center’s First Amendment Summit. “If you asked me 10 or 20 years ago, I would probably have said that the main problems facing freedom of expression emanate from religious extremism,” Rushdie said. “I think now we’re facing another old enemy, which is authoritarianism. I think there’s a real rise in authoritarian movements around the world, populist authoritarian demagoguery. … So I think the problem is, I would now say, political more than primarily religious.”
After receiving more than 150 applications in the first 24 hours of the fund’s opening, the first round of Screenwriter Emergency Financial Assistance grants are reaching early-career screenwriters. One grantee told us, “PEN America’s kindness, community, and support is truly appreciated and will help me stay afloat during these trying times.”
As part of our PEN Ten series, we interviewed our current crop of Emerging Voices fellows. This fellowship provides a five-month immersive mentorship program for early career writers from communities traditionally underrepresented in the publishing world. One writer described it as “being in community with writers who inspire me every day to return to the page.”
As a child, PEN America member Terry McDonell imagined epic stories about his father, a fighter pilot who died in World War II. But, as he discovers in his dazzling memoir Irma: The Education of a Mother’s Son, the real hero in his life was his mother. From his recollections—a series of colorful, deeply personal, sometimes funny, stunningly composed vignettes—an intriguing and poignant portrait emerges. Irma is the story of a formidable woman who built the life she wanted as she raised her son to be the kind of man and father he had longed for but never knew.
Suzanne Nossel spoke to Margaret Sullivan for the Guardian about Elon Musk declaring open season for hate on X, formerly known as Twitter. (The Guardian)
We worked with Harper’s Bazaar on a beautiful feature package on book bans, featuring a scrollable, shoppable list of every book currently banned in the United States. (Harper’s Bazaar)
We partnered with the “Alt New College”, which was inaugurated as a response to the unprecedented takeover of the New College of Florida and resulting limits on academic expression. (Chronicle of Higher Education)
PEN America also submitted a report to the United Nations Committee on Civil and Political Rights, criticizing the human rights record of the United States on free expression, discrimination, and privacy. (PEN)
We had a sold-out opening reception for Return to Sender: Prison as Censorship, an exhibit co-organized by our Prison and Justice Writing Program. (PEN)
WHAT WE'RE READING
2023 PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award winner Narges Mohammadi: Our struggle against violent and brutal repression will persist “until the day when light takes over darkness and the sun of freedom embraces the Iranian people.” (The New York Times)
Russian Court Declines to Consider WSJ Reporter Evan Gershkovich’s Detention Appeal (The Wall Street Journal)
The Homeschooler Who Made ‘Parental Rights’ a GOP Rallying Cry (The Washington Post)
Conservative Content Bans Move from Classroom to Web (Axios)
Red States Quit Nation’s Oldest Library Group Amid Culture War Over Books (The Washington Post)
"I think it is a principle in fiction: you don’t get to know everything, some things are a little private."
- Zadie Smith, in conversation with Yaa Gyasi at PEN Out Loud
TRENDING @ PENAMERICA
‘There’s nothing wrong with me. There’s nothing wrong with my husband, or our relationship, or our dogs.’
This summer, Urbandale, Iowa, schools identified nearly 400 books for removal, including The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou, and The Adventures of Honey & Leon by Alan Cumming, a picture book about his dogs and their dads. Cumming joined our Instagram to share his support of the freedom to read.
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