May 2013
12 posts
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“If I lied to my readers, the prose would suffer… It blunts the edges.”
– Naomi Wolf in Obsession: Naomi Wolf on Truth at The Standard (via penlive)
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“There can be no immediate rupture from the past.”
– Siphiwo Mahala, on the legacy of apartheid in South Africa
Read more at Words Without Borders
(via penamerican)
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April 2013
19 posts
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“Do you know why I told you stories?…When I thought you couldn’t walk I wanted to...”
– Vaddey Ratner from In the Shadow of the Banyan (via amandajkillian)
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“If anyone suggests [Mandela’s] a multi-millionaire, they’re wrong....”
– Nelson Mandela’s lawyer George Bizos
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“It always irks when rightwing folk demonstrate in a familial or exclusive...”
– Actor Russel Brand, on Margaret Thatcher
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North Korea Backgrounder
humanrightswatch:
Kim Jong-Un’s succession as North Korea’s supreme leader after the death of his father, Kim Jong-Il, in December 2011 had little impact on the country’s dire human rights record.
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) systematically violates the rights of its population. The government has ratified four key international human rights treaties and includes...
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“So what is the solution to the copyright wars? It’s the same solution we...”
– Cory Doctorow
March 2013
20 posts
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Iraqi librarian saved 30,000 books during 2003... →
“About ten days after the troops entered [Basra], the library was completely burnt down. We carried about 30,000 books to the restaurant and to our homes. Then, we transferred them from the restaurant to our homes in my own car and in cars belonging to the employees. Most of these books and manuscripts were rare and important ones. Regrettably, we lost a lot of books in the fire,” she said.
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“It was a shocking thing to say and I knew it was a shocking thing to say. But no...”
– Philip Pullman (via penamerican)
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Storytelling and Criminal Justice
Justice Talking: Stories about Crime, Punishment, and Life (and Death) in the Legal System
Location:CENTERSTAGE, 700 North Calvert Street, Baltimore, MDEvent Date:March 18, 2013Event Time:7:00 p.m.
This event will feature seven storytellers telling seven-minute true, personal, tales about their experiences with the criminal justice system.
If this message was forwarded to you, please sign...
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“It has never been easier to be a writer; and it has never been harder to be a...”
– Adam Gopnik on writing today: http://nyr.kr/ZFRu7k (via newyorker)
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“People who fear failure will never innovate. A real innovator embraces risk and...”
– Alec Ross, on his exit from the State Department as Senior Advisor for Innovation
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Grandmother Power! →
penamerican:
Paola Gianturco’s book Grandmother Power, a moving collection of essays and photographs from powerHouse Books, profiles grandmother activists from 15 countries on five continents around the world who are agitating for change and for the rights of their grandchildren. Below is an excerpt from the chapter entitled “Justice: Argentina.”
Argentine grandmothers began searching for...
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“What kind of a country do we live in, if we don’t have a first lady, but have a...”
– Elena Eskova, on gender politics in Belarus.
President Alexander Lukashenko’s wife is never seen in public and his mother remains unnamed.
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Writers get ready. PEN Haiti's house of literature... →
penamerican:
Named in honor of Georges Anglade, an ethnographer and academic who died in the January 2010 earthquake, the sprawling, mountainside facility is swiftly becoming a hub for youth education and international exchanges after opening in August 2012.
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“While my government is truly grateful for the strategic opportunities presented...”
– Joseph Torsella, United States ambassador for management and reform at the United Nations 