PEN Remembers Lucy Kavaler
PEN American Center mourns the loss of Lucy Kavaler, one of our most active, inspiring, and beloved Freedom to Write advocates. Lucy passed away October 30, 2010 in New… More
Reading from The Taxi Project by Martha Kuwee Kumsa
I was released in September 1989 after a decade of torture and incarceration. Even though my imprisonment was limited to the radius of the prison compound—Ethiopia itself was a… More
Roxana Robinson Reads from Life and Death in Shanghai by Nien Cheng
As I followed the female guard, I breathed deeply the sweet night air. We walked around the main building, passed through a peeling and faded red gate with a… More
Kathy Park Hong Reads from “The Flowers of Hell” by Nguyen Chi Thien
In the Jungle Night a Bird CallsIn the jungle night a strange bird callsFollowed by a guard’s tripping shoe soundsA patrol flashlight beams here and thereFrom the cells come… More
Roxana Robinson Reads from The Little School Tales of Disappearance and Survival
Last time I heard my full name it was at Army headquarters, the evening of the day I was kidnapped. The military man repeated it in a calm and… More
A Person of Interest
Lee closed the door and crept onto his bed. He hadn’t pressed the button of the lock; he was afraid he might be reprimanded. He heard the thump of… More
Sarah Schulman Reads from an Unpublished Memoir
Bored as I was, I began, along with a few other inmates, to make worry beads. The dough of the bread was the material we used to form the… More
The Truth That Killed
The preview of my play before a restricted invited audience had been planned by the theatre management with two aims in view—to sound out the authorities and to seek… More
Vera B. Williams Reads from It Only Happens To Other People
When morning comes and they escort you to the maximum security prison, your last hope of release evaporates, and you are resigned to the completion of the process: sudden… More
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