About PEN

ASKING QUESTIONS
I'd say both PEN and Paris Review are protected assets, vulnerable spots on the literary Beast, based on the reaction generated when asking questions about them, which is all I've been doing. The barriers of disinformation and demi-puppets surrounding them may be too much for me to overcome.

In a related topic, it's amazing to me how individuals like "Roody McDoody" and "Harland" ("Guildenstern" and "The Assassin") can be turned into absolute tools of established literary power.

PEN
PEN in its various manifestations is hard to assail, because it does much good work. Since its founding its purpose has been to propagate liberal Anglo-American values (democracy; freedom) around the planet-- values I agree with. The questions are two. First, whether these values are being realized in our own society, or in PEN itself. I say no. The second question is about the world context within which PEN has operated: the spread of Anglo-American financial and military power which has always seemed to accompany Anglo-American values. In other words, the spread of Empire, which was NOT a value upon which the American republic was founded. We seem to have fully adopted the redcoat, "BBC liberal" ideology against which the American Revolution stood opposed.

IF the American ideal has been perverted, this is a question well worth investigating. Frenzied opposition to the question is mere blowing of smoke.