The M Word Stories: Wajahat Ali
If you aren’t writing your own story your story is always being written for you by others…It's imperative that people of good will and talent pick up the pen. More
Hilton Als on James Baldwin
I had wanted to dislike him more than I do in order to have some distance from his influence, but it is an influence I have absorbed. More
“Little White House,” “Baby Deer,” and “Summer 2000”
There's a place on my jogging route that always makes me cringe. That little white house on the corner. We parked there on election day. More
Out and Out
I marveled at my weightlessness and wondered why my father hadn’t stayed here in Spain when he’d first escaped Libya…where you could swim out and out and never sink. More
Nikki Giovanni: Making James Baldwin
Never deny what your heart knows is the truth. Never turn your back on what your mind knows is right. Never refuse to hear the cry of the angry… More
Rereading & Rewriting Crime
We can respond to this crisis as a literary community by centering and seriously considering the work that casts prison, prisoners, and the prison state/industry in new light. More
The PEN Ten with Malka Older
Writers mirror their societies, reflecting back and interpreting what they see with enough distance and distortion for recognition and insights and evolution to occur. More
Carl Hancock Rux Reads James Baldwin
To celebrate James Baldwin's birthday, here's a 2001 recording of poet, playwright, and novelist Carl Hancock Rux reading Baldwin's work at PEN America's Twentieth-Century Masters Tribute event. More
Christopher Hitchens On George Orwell
In this 2002 recording from the PEN America Digital Archive, Christopher Hitchens offers a critical analysis of Orwell's works from his own intellectual perspective. More
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