“I refuse to accept that inequality or violence and suffering are things we must accept as facts of life as if we do not dare to want for better, for more. I see this world as it is but I refuse to accept this world as it is. In my writing, there is no room for complacency.”
Roxane Gay
A fierce and masterful writer, cultural critic, and social media powerhouse, Roxane Gay writes with prodigious bravery about gender, sexuality and race. This year, the author of the critically acclaimed An Untamed State, Bad Feminist, and the forthcoming Hunger, will deliver the Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture – the PEN World Voices Festival’s grand finale, in which leading voices address critical free expression challenges. Named for the former PEN president and fierce defender of the freedom of expression, the Lecture has included, in past years, luminaries such as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Orhan Pamuk, Umberto Eco, Nawal El Saadawi, Wole Soyinka, Colm Tóibín, and Salman Rushdie.
A conversation with writer and poet Saeed Jones will follow the lecture.