Blog

Filter By:

AdvocacyAnalysisBlogCommentaryDramaEssayEventFeatureFictionGraphic NarrativeInterviewMemoirNewsObituaryOpen LetterPoetryPress ReleaseProfile

Browse By Series:

PEN Poetry Series •  Prison WritingThe PEN Ten InterviewsIllustrated PEN • Pen PalsThe PEN World

Browse By Email Subscription:

PEN America NewsEducational Censorship NewsWorks of Justice 

A Gloom Is Cast Upon the Ancient Steps

Chapter 2. Claimants to the InheritanceHe didn’t recognize his aunt Tatyana Leonidovna in the old woman who met him on the platform. “The years had left an indelible imprint… More

And Yet…

Censorship—for most writers it’s a word that immediately raises a red flag. It brings up visions of totalitarian states abroad and right-wing cabals at home. What first-amendment-loving, ACLU-supporting scribe… More

Siberia

My father's mother once dragged her adversary out of the house by the hair. By the hair she grabbed hold of her, says my father, and whirled her around… More

A Fahrenheit 450 Story

This is a Fahrenheit 450 story, only hot enough to burn my butt, no blazing tale of the censorship wars. While heroic writers speaking truth to power face secret… More

Shelomo Ibn Gabirol (1021/22 – c. 1057/58)

Philosopher, misanthrope, and spectacular fly in the ointment of the refined eleventh-century Andalusian-Jewish elite, Shelomo Ibn Gabirol, the second major poet of the period, comes down to us as… More

Yosef Qimhi

Born in southern Spain, Yosef Qimhi was father to a famous line of sons who distinguished themselves in various fields of learning, particularly Hebrew grammar and biblical commentary. Sometime… More

Shmu’el Hanagid (993 – 1056)

The major poets of the period emerge in the third generation, and they are masters of their art in every respect and giants in the history of Hebrew literature.… More