PEN_Annual_Report_2010-2011

• PEN’s presence at the Nobel Prize ceremony for Liu Xiaobo and our own relentless campaign for his release fromprison. Read Freedom to Write Program Director Larry Siems’ dispatch from Oslo here• the “Honor Courage” campaign, an initiative to gain public recognition for the American servicemen and women,intelligence officers, and other public officials who fought to stop the abuse and torture of prisoners in U.S. custody2011 also marked the 25th anniversary of the 1986 PEN Congress in New York, described as “a gathering of writersthat has become a literary legend ” by Salman Rushdie, who was inspired by the Congress to create the PEN WorldVoices Festival. Presided over by Arthur Miller and then-PEN President Norman Mailer, participants explored literatureas, in Salman’s words, “a lofty, transnational, transcultural force, that could in [Saul] Bellow’s great formulation,‘open the universe a little more.’” Among those attending were Rushdie, Günter Grass, Wole Soyinka, Mario VargasLlosa, Saul Bellow, Raymond Carver, E.L. Doctorow, Toni Morrison, Edward Said, William Styron, John Updike, KurtVonnegut, Susan Sontag, Czeslaw Milosz, Ryszard Kapu ści ński, Nadine Gordimer, and J. M. Coetzee. We honored thisanniversary during the 2011 PEN World Voices Festival at a symposium with writers addressing the responsibilities ofwriter-intellectuals today, opened by Toni Morrison’s stirring argument for literature as a bulwark of truth, reason, andimagination to move a society forward.Shirin Ebadi, 2003 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, accepted the PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award onbehalf of Nasrin Sotoudeh at the 2011 Gala, expressing gratitude to all members of the PEN community for thisopportunity to put pressure on the government of Iran for Sotoudeh’s release:“My dear colleague was very eager to send her personalmessage tonight, however, in prison, she is even deprivedof prisoner’s rights…and could not send her message…Iproudly accept the prize on her behalf and thank all thosewho respect freedom of expression, not only in their owncountries, but all over the world.Next year, 2012, we will celebrate PEN American Center’s 90th anniversary.It as an important benchmark, both for the durability of the idealism of PENAmerican Center’s founding principles and for the generosity of those whosustain our work.With warm regards,”K. Anthony appiah & Steven L. IsenbergK. Anthony AppiahPresidentSteven L. IsenbergExecutive DirectorPen American center annual report 2011 // 06