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Four Questions for Simon Armitage, Winner of the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation
For the first time in my life I was bilingual, even if I could only communicate with people who had been dead for half a millennium. More
Four Questions for Tess Lewis, Winner of the 2017 PEN Translation Prize
I always read my drafts out loud when I’m polishing them—I find it easier to hear mistakes or awkward passages than to 'see' them. More
from The Girls in My Town
With the fortune-teller’s words echoing in my head, I told myself to fight like a warrior. Screaming felt good. I screamed until my throat became sandpaper. More
In-Between Days
"I was feeling no pain, by which I mean, I was overmedicated." More
DARE: Daily Alert on Rights and Expression
President Trump marks the Independence Day holiday with a tweeted video of him pummeling a person whose head is a CNN logo. And the writer who tracked the source… More
The PEN Ten with Deborah Smith
I never discuss a translation while I’m working on it, because for me the author’s voice and intention are all there on the page. More
Read the Resistance, July 2017: The Scarlet Letter
The Scarlet Letter is a great novel of resistance by a woman who opposes the patriarchy, hypocrisy, and misogyny of her world with stubborn, mute, but unbending insistence. More
New video tweet of Donald Trump is valorizing and modeling brutal physical attacks on journalists
NEW YORK—In response to President Trump's latest tweet depicting him attacking an individual whose head has been replaced by the CNN logo, PEN America Executive Director Suzanne Nossel released… More
United Arab Emirates (UAE): Arbitrary detention of prominent writer and human rights defender reaches three months
Ahmed Mansoor al-Shehhi (أحمد منصور الشحي), a 47 year-old Emirati citizen, was reportedly arrested by dozens of uniformed security agents who broke into his home in the city of Ajman.… More
CHINA: Writer and Nobel laureate released from prison on medical grounds
PEN is gravely concerned for the health of dissident writer, Independent Chinese PEN Center (ICPC) member and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Liu Xiaobo, following news of his diagnosis of… More
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