$10
The PEN Festival: New European Fiction
Sat., May 01, 2010 / 12:00 PM
Audio / Video
Gallery
About This Event
Minimum Age:
All AgesDoors Open:
12:00 PMShow Time:
1:00 PMDescription:
To celebrate the launch of the highly acclaimed new anthology series Best European
Fiction, editor Aleksandar Hemon leads two back-to-back programs of reading and
discussion.
Continuing their recent conversation in the pages of The Believer, Best European Fiction series editor Aleksandar Hemon will speak with Colum McCann, who will be writing the preface for next year’s anthology, about the current state of fiction in Europe and their own sense as Europeans about what European fiction now has to offer American and world readers. Three contributors to the inaugural volume, from Belgium, Portugal, and Denmark, will read from their work and discuss with Hemon exciting things happening right now in the literature of their countries.
PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature: A week-long celebration of books and writing from around the globe, featuring 130 writers from 40 different countries. Don't miss this exciting cross-cultural literary exchange including conversations, panel discussions, readings, a translation slam, and an all-star Cabaret! New York City, April 26-May 2, 2010. <www.pen.org/festival>
This is a first come seated event. Seating is limited and not guaranteed; please arrive early.
Tickets are $10, or $8 for PEN members.
Continuing their recent conversation in the pages of The Believer, Best European Fiction series editor Aleksandar Hemon will speak with Colum McCann, who will be writing the preface for next year’s anthology, about the current state of fiction in Europe and their own sense as Europeans about what European fiction now has to offer American and world readers. Three contributors to the inaugural volume, from Belgium, Portugal, and Denmark, will read from their work and discuss with Hemon exciting things happening right now in the literature of their countries.
PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature: A week-long celebration of books and writing from around the globe, featuring 130 writers from 40 different countries. Don't miss this exciting cross-cultural literary exchange including conversations, panel discussions, readings, a translation slam, and an all-star Cabaret! New York City, April 26-May 2, 2010. <www.pen.org/festival>
This is a first come seated event. Seating is limited and not guaranteed; please arrive early.
Tickets are $10, or $8 for PEN members.
Artists
Naja Marie Aidt
Naja Marie Aidt is a Danish language poet and writer.
She was born in Egedesminde, Greenland, and was brought up partly in Greenland and partly in the Vesterbro area of Copenhagen. In 1991 she published her first book of poetry, Så længe jeg er ung (While I'm Still Young). Since 1993 she has been a full-time writer. In 1994 Naja Marie Aidt was awarded the Danish Fund for the Endowment of the Arts 3-year bursary.
Aidt won the Nordic Council's Literature Prize in 2008, for her short stories collection Bavian (Baboon, 2006).[1] Bavian also earned her the Danish Kritikerprisen for 2006.
She was born in Egedesminde, Greenland, and was brought up partly in Greenland and partly in the Vesterbro area of Copenhagen. In 1991 she published her first book of poetry, Så længe jeg er ung (While I'm Still Young). Since 1993 she has been a full-time writer. In 1994 Naja Marie Aidt was awarded the Danish Fund for the Endowment of the Arts 3-year bursary.
Aidt won the Nordic Council's Literature Prize in 2008, for her short stories collection Bavian (Baboon, 2006).[1] Bavian also earned her the Danish Kritikerprisen for 2006.
Aleksandar Hemon
Aleksandar Hemon is the author of The Lazarus Project, which was a finalist for the 2008 National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award, and three collections of short stories: The Question of Bruno; Nowhere Man, which was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; and Love and Obstacles, which will be published by Riverhead Books on May 14, 2009. Born in Sarajevo, Hemon visited Chicago in 1992, intending to stay for a matter of months. While he was there, Sarajevo came under siege, and he was unable to return home. Hemon wrote his first story in English in 1995. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2003 and a “genius grant” from the MacArthur Foundation in 2004. He lives in Chicago with his wife and daughter.
valter hugo mãe
valter hugo mãe is a Portuguese writer, editor, artist, and singer.
Colum McCann
Colum McCann is the author of two collections of short stories and five novels, including "This Side of Brightness,""Dancer" and “Zoli,” all of which were international best-sellers. His newest novel is “Let the Great World Spin.” His fiction has been published in 30 languages and has appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, GQ, Paris Review, Bomb and other places. He has written for numerous publications including The Irish Times, Die Zeit, La Republicca, Paris Match, The New York Times, the Guardian and the Independent.
In 2003 Colum was named Esquire magazine's "Writer of the Year." Other awards and honors include a Pushcart Prize, the Rooney Prize, the Hennessy Award for Irish Literature, the Irish Independent Hughes and Hughes/Sunday Independent Novel of the Year 2003, and the 2002 Ireland Fund of Monaco Princess Grace Memorial Literary Award.
His short film "Everything in this Country Must," directed by Gary McKendry, was nominated for an Academy Award Oscar in 2005. Award.
In May 2009 Colum was inducted into Aosdana, the equivalent of the Irish Academy, one of Ireland’s highest literary honours. Award.
In fall 2009, Colum will be awarded a French Chevalier des arts et lettres by the French government, making him one of a exclusive number of foreign artists recognised in France for their literary contributions: other recipients have included Paul Auster, Salman Rushdie and Julian Barnes. Award.
In September 2009 Colum will be awarded the Deauville Festival of Cinema Literary Prize in Deauxville, France. Award.
Colum was born in Dublin in 1965 and began his career as a journalist in The Irish Press. In the early 1980's he took a bicycle across North America and then worked as a wilderness guide in a program for juvenile delinquents in Texas. After a year and a half in Japan, he and his wife Allison moved to New York where they currently live with their three children, Isabella, John Michael and Christian. Award.
Colum teaches in Hunter College in New York, in the Creative Writing program, with fellow novelists Peter Carey and Nathan Englander. Award.
Colum’s fifth novel, "Let the Great World Spin” is scheduled for release in the U.S on June 23rd, 2009. An extract was published in the Paris Review in fall 2008, followed by another extract in Bomb magazine. The British and Irish release will be in August, while European publishers will quickly follow up – in what amounts to an unprecedented international publication – in September 2009. Award.
The novel begins in August 1974 as a tightrope walker makes his way through the dawn light across the World Trade Center towers, stunning thousands of watchers below. Using the true story of Philippe Petit as a pull-through metaphor, McCann crafts a portrait of the city and a people. There’s Corrigan, a radical young Irish monk, who struggles with his own demons as he lives among the prostitutes in the burning Bronx. A group of mothers gather in a Park Avenue apartment to mourn the sons who died in Vietnam – they soon discover how much divides them even in their grief. Further uptown, Tillie, a 38-year-old grandmother, turns tricks alongside her teenaged daughter, determined not only to take care of her “babies” but to prove her own worth. Award.
Elegantly weaving together these and other seemingly disparate lives, McCann’s powerful allegory of 9/11 comes alive in the unforgettable voices of the city’s people, unexpectedly drawn together by hope, beauty, and the tightrope walker’s “artistic crime of the century.” McCann’s most ambitious work to date, Let the Great World Spin has already been described as a triumphant American novel. Award.
Tour dates for “Let the Great World Spin” are announced here and will be regularly updated.
In 2003 Colum was named Esquire magazine's "Writer of the Year." Other awards and honors include a Pushcart Prize, the Rooney Prize, the Hennessy Award for Irish Literature, the Irish Independent Hughes and Hughes/Sunday Independent Novel of the Year 2003, and the 2002 Ireland Fund of Monaco Princess Grace Memorial Literary Award.
His short film "Everything in this Country Must," directed by Gary McKendry, was nominated for an Academy Award Oscar in 2005. Award.
In May 2009 Colum was inducted into Aosdana, the equivalent of the Irish Academy, one of Ireland’s highest literary honours. Award.
In fall 2009, Colum will be awarded a French Chevalier des arts et lettres by the French government, making him one of a exclusive number of foreign artists recognised in France for their literary contributions: other recipients have included Paul Auster, Salman Rushdie and Julian Barnes. Award.
In September 2009 Colum will be awarded the Deauville Festival of Cinema Literary Prize in Deauxville, France. Award.
Colum was born in Dublin in 1965 and began his career as a journalist in The Irish Press. In the early 1980's he took a bicycle across North America and then worked as a wilderness guide in a program for juvenile delinquents in Texas. After a year and a half in Japan, he and his wife Allison moved to New York where they currently live with their three children, Isabella, John Michael and Christian. Award.
Colum teaches in Hunter College in New York, in the Creative Writing program, with fellow novelists Peter Carey and Nathan Englander. Award.
Colum’s fifth novel, "Let the Great World Spin” is scheduled for release in the U.S on June 23rd, 2009. An extract was published in the Paris Review in fall 2008, followed by another extract in Bomb magazine. The British and Irish release will be in August, while European publishers will quickly follow up – in what amounts to an unprecedented international publication – in September 2009. Award.
The novel begins in August 1974 as a tightrope walker makes his way through the dawn light across the World Trade Center towers, stunning thousands of watchers below. Using the true story of Philippe Petit as a pull-through metaphor, McCann crafts a portrait of the city and a people. There’s Corrigan, a radical young Irish monk, who struggles with his own demons as he lives among the prostitutes in the burning Bronx. A group of mothers gather in a Park Avenue apartment to mourn the sons who died in Vietnam – they soon discover how much divides them even in their grief. Further uptown, Tillie, a 38-year-old grandmother, turns tricks alongside her teenaged daughter, determined not only to take care of her “babies” but to prove her own worth. Award.
Elegantly weaving together these and other seemingly disparate lives, McCann’s powerful allegory of 9/11 comes alive in the unforgettable voices of the city’s people, unexpectedly drawn together by hope, beauty, and the tightrope walker’s “artistic crime of the century.” McCann’s most ambitious work to date, Let the Great World Spin has already been described as a triumphant American novel. Award.
Tour dates for “Let the Great World Spin” are announced here and will be regularly updated.
Jean-Philippe Toussaint
Jean-Philippe Toussaint (born 29 November, 1957, Brussels) is a Belgian prose writer and filmmaker. His books have been translated into more than twenty languages and he has had his photographs displayed in Brussels and Japan. Toussaint won the Prix Médicis in 2005 for his novel Fuir. The 2006 book La mélancolie de Zidane (Paris: Minuit, 2006) is a lyrical essay on the headbutt administered by the French football player Zinedine Zidane to the Italian player Marco Materazzi during the 2006 World Cup final in Berlin. An English translation was published in 2007 in the British journal New Formations. His 2009 novel La Vérité sur Marie won the prestigious Prix Décembre.