Thursday I posted a partial list of the writers who protest the courage award to Charlie Hebdo; via Glenn Greenwald here is the full list:

Chris Abani

Leslie Absher

Elizabeth Adams

Gabeba Baderoon

Deborah Baker

Russell Banks

Susan Bell

Naomi Benaron

Helen Benedict

Cara Benson

Charles Ramírez Berg

Susan Bernofsky

Eric Bogosian

Donald Breckenridge

Ami Sands Brodoff

Karen Brown Brooks

Janet Burroway

Helene Cardona

Peter Carey

Bryn Chancellor

Carmela Ciuraru

Patricia Clark

Tony Cohan

Teju Cole

Michael Cunningham

Emily M. Danforth

Tod Davies

Siddhartha Deb

Junot Díaz

Erin Edmison

Brent Hayes Edwards

Brian T. Edwards

Deborah Eisenberg

Hedi El Kholti

Trey Ellis

Eve Ensler

Elizabeth Enslin

Barbara Epler

Jennifer Cody Epstein

Ali Eteraz

Percival Everett

Marlon L. Fick

Boris Fishman… Read the rest

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Andrew Solomon and Suzanne Nossel explain why PEN is giving Charlie Hebdo an award.

Although censorship has traditionally been the province primarily of governments, attempts to curb speech are likewise undertaken by vigilantes who employ threats and violence. In the last few months we have seen shootings at Charlie Hebdo and at a free-speech event in Copenhagen; the hacking to death of two Bangladeshi atheist bloggers, one of them an American; a death threat against an Australian political cartoonist by jihadists; and the gunning down of a Pakistani social activist.

I missed the death threat against an Australian political cartoonist, but all the other items I’ve been ranting about relentlessly.

These audacious attacks aim to terrorize a worldwide audience

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Philip Gourevitch tweets:

Philip Gourevitch @PGourevitch 13 hours ago
Congolese French novelist/Man Booker finalist @amabanckou to present PEN award to CharlieHebdo http://www.lexpress.fr/culture/livre/alain-mabanckou-remettra-le-prix-liberte-d-expression-de-pen-a-charlie-hebdo_1676505.html …

Peter Carey, Francine Prose, please note.

Updating to add a cartoon via Twitter RTd by Alain Mabanckou:

… Read the rest

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A satirical cartoonist on people who don’t understand or appreciate satirical cartoons:

Patreon.… Read the rest

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Stewart at Gnu Atheism:

… Read the rest

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From a translation of what the head of SOS Racisme said about Charlie Hebdo in January.

… Read the rest

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Justin Erik Halldór Smith on Charlie Hebdo.

In response to the recent attempt by some members of PEN to betray persecuted editorialists throughout the world by refusing to honor the survivors of a right-wing death squad’s attack on a group of caricature artists in Paris a few months ago, Harper’s has taken my April essay out from behind its paywall. Many have been writing on the Internet about their exasperation with all the ‘think pieces’ on this topic. When will we have finally had enough? they wonder. My answer is that there will be no more need for ‘think pieces’ when there will be sufficiently serious thinking about this question. What the PEN protesters have given us is

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Katha Pollitt stands up for Charlie Hebdo.

When PEN decided to award the first PEN/Toni and James C. Goodale Freedom of Expression Courage Award to the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, they surely thought they were honoring bravery in defense of free speech. This was a magazine that kept publishing after its offices were firebombed by Islamists in 2011, and kept publishing after nine staffers were horribly murdered by Islamists in January. Compare that to, say, Yale University Press, which dropped the illustrations for Jytte Clausen’s book about the Danish Mohammed cartoons after the book’s first printing, or Random House, which canceled publication of Sherry Jones’s The Jewel of Medina, a historical novel about Mohammed’s wife Aisha.

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Salman Rushdie tweets:

Salman Rushdie @SalmanRushdie 12 hours ago
Salman Rushdie retweeted Philip Gourevitch
The head of SOS-Racisme calls CH the greatest anti racist weekly. PEN protesters, please note. Salman Rushdie added,

Philip Gourevitch @PGourevitch
“Charlie Hebdo, le plus grand hebdomadaire anti-raciste”: more French context from Dominique Sopo, Pres of SOS-Racism http://www.europe1.fr/mediacenter/emissions/europe-midi-votre-journal-wendy-bouchard/videos/charlie-hebdo-est-le-plus-grand-hebdomadaire-anti-raciste-2341899 …

And:

Salman Rushdie @SalmanRushdie 11 hours ago
Now that the leading anti-racist group SOS-Racisme has called CH “the greatest anti-racist weekly”, will PEN protesters admit their error?

Le plus grand hebdomadaire anti-raciste:

EXTRAIT – Le président de SOS racisme prend la défense du journal qui a été la cible d’un attentat.

The president of SOS Racism defends the magazine that was the target of

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How not to start a piece about PEN and Charlie Hebdo and The Protest.

The annual PEN Literary Gala, in which writers, the male half badly dressed in once-a-year tuxedos, assemble under the big whale at the American Museum of Natural History to mutter about their advances and applaud their imprisoned confreres, has always had its comic aspects. Glamour and guys (or gals) who write are not two subjects that are often congruent.

Sigh. We are not a parenthesis. We are not an afterthought. We are not the other. We are not the exception. We are not second. We are not an eccentric forgotten deviation from the rule that writers (and all other important people) are men. We are … Read the rest

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NPR reports that Francine Prose tells NPR that 150 writers have joined the anti-Charlie Hebdo protest.

The protest over a free speech award to Charlie Hebdo continues to grow.

Earlier this week, six authors withdrew from the PEN American Center’s annual gala in response to the organization’s decision to give the French satirical magazine its Freedom of Expression Courage Award.

Former PEN American President Francine Prose was one of the original six. She tells NPR that as of Thursday afternoon, she’s been joined by nearly 150 other writers — such as Junot Díaz, Lorrie Moore and Rick Moody — who’ve signed on to an open letter critical of the decision.

Disgusting.… Read the rest

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