On James Baldwin’s Go Tell it on the Mountain
Whatever fear strikes any reader of Baldwin’s book awaits right in that opening paragraph: an unseemly portrait of faith. It is not literary sex, or violence, or the conflation… More
Animal Farm: Banned by the Soviets, Promoted by the CIA
Though the book cannot and should not be divorced from the Russian Revolution, Orwell sees beyond the specifics of that revolution, and even beyond revolution itself, to tell what… More
Reservation Sunsets and ‘Salem’s Lot
Maybe the banning advocate truly is the 13 year old, terrified that his secret life is out, that some novelist had looked into his private world and reported from… More
On Beauty: Banning Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye
The narrative that Pecola absorbs from the world around her is simple. It tells her that to be beautiful is to be white. It shapes her identity at the… More
Alert Us
Are you an artist at risk or know someone who is?
PEN America On 
On today's edition of #thePENpod, we speak with poet @catrachxs about their debut collection of poems, CATRACHOS, which they call a sort of Bildungsroman collection that reflects queer identity and resilience. LISTEN 🎧 : https://bit.ly/3epn8SH.
Two time Booker Prize finalist Chigozie Obioma's song selections for the @penworldvoices Just Press Play playlist series are a collection of tracks that inspire him, spark his creativity, and reflect his worldly and multilingual outlook on life. https://bit.ly/2WgNZtZ
Good news about the fate of arrested Chinese dissidents is rare. His own smile in this picture well reflects how we feel about word that Professor Xu Zhangrun, jailed for an essay critical of Xi Jinping, has been released from detention. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/12/world/asia/xu-zhangrun-china-xi.html?referringSource=articleShare