2010 in Review : PEN American Center
2010 was an exceptional year for the PEN American Center and our essential callings to protect free expression and to promote literature. The crowning moment was the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to former International Chinese PEN Center (ICPC) President Liu Xiaobo, renowned writer and political activist. From our New Year's Eve rally on the steps of the New York Public Library, to his poetry we had translated and read by PEN Members, to Anthony Appiah's nomination of Liu for the Nobel and his recent testimony before a Congressional committee, our championing of Liu's cause was at the center of our work. Recently, a friend of Liu and his wife wrote to PEN on their behalf, commending PEN's "brilliant efforts," which he called "truly admirable, and indispensible to our cause."
In addition to our campaign on Liu's behalf, PEN is monitoring more than 1,000 writers in prison, on trial, or under threat in more than 90 countries and actively campaigning on behalf of more than 150 writers in prison at any given moment. Nor do the threats to free expression come only from the imprisonment of those who dare to speak. PEN's 2010 free expression advocacy programming included "State of Emergency: Censorship by Bullet in Mexico," presented in partnership with Mexican PEN to call attention to the violent silencing of Mexican journalists; "Secularism, Islam, and Democracy: Muslims in Europe and the West," Tariq Ramadan's first U.S. program; and "Faith and Free Speech," a video presented in Geneva at a meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council to counter recent initiatives aimed at prohibiting speech considered blasphemous.
Our work for free expression goes hand in hand with our promotion of literature, as we strive to build connections among literary cultures across borders. This year we celebrated the sixth anniversary of the PEN World Voices Festival that featured both acclaimed international and American writers, such as Toni Morrison, Richard Ford, Roddy Doyle, and Ben Okri; we published the 12th and 13th issues of PEN America, our award-winning literary journal; and we presented literary awards honoring the achievement of writers and translators in 14 categories, including two new awards: the PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing and the PEN/W.G. Sebald Award. Among this year's winners were Don DeLillo, Anne Carson, Theresa Rebeck, and Paul Harding.
In other areas, PEN's Readers & Writers Program doubled its instruction hours in the Summer Writing Institute for public high school students; PEN's Prison Writing Program received 1,400 submissions from inmates nationally for the 2010 Prison Writing Contest and is distributing a new edition of its Handbook for Writers in Prison; and we continued to support translation through grants, online translation slams, and the fourth annual online Translation Feature.
All of this, of course, happens because of the generous contributions of PEN Members and supporters. Your support of PEN confirms your belief in the power of free expression and literature to enrich every aspect of human life. "Against oppression we must be armed," as Gabriel García Márquez wrote to PEN, "with the weapons of intelligence and the word--which fortunately are ours ..."
Please consider making a contribution to help support our ongoing efforts. All of us here at PEN will be most grateful.
Sincerely,
Steven L. Isenberg
Executive Director, PEN American Center
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