A Summary

Here are several of the key posts concerning the Petition to PEN protest.
www.kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2009/04/pen-background.html
www.kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2009/04/does-pen-support-needy-writers.html
www.kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2009/04/more-pen-facts.html
www.kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2009/04/facts-about-pen.html
www.kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2009/05/pen-yacht-parties.html
www.kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-pen-corruption.html
www.kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2009/06/just-facts.html
www.kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2009/05/when-did-pen-lose-its-soul.html

This is just part of the argument. As well, more is to be added.

Pseudo-Liberals

I've had an interesting email from writer Jacqueline Sarah Homan, latest to join the protest at
www.penpetition.blogspot.com
She pointed out the importance of "presentation" (image) to the bourgeois personality. We've also discussed the strange case of super-liberal Barbara Ehrenreich, who's made millions out of speaking FOR working and lower class people, yet to date has refused to sign the Petition to PEN herself. (She knows about it.) In many ways she's more detrimental to the plight of underground writers than a straight-up opposed reactionary, because she displaces our authentic voice, leaving our kind of writer more shut out than ever.

A similar case to Ehrenreich is PBS TV liberal Thomas Frank, a former zeenster of sorts who's ignored three packets of information mailed to him about the PEN matter. It seems that, given a choice between career fortune and supposed principles, they easily throw the latter overboard. Which tels me they weren't very genuine to start with.

The chief example of the pseudo-liberal mindset is PEN American Center, which postures as the defender of the underdog-- raising funds and throwing lavish parties in so doing-- at the same time it shuns said underdog in this country. They're able to compartmentalize their ruthless blackballing behind a Potemkin-style facade of goodness.

My readership has followed this protest for five months. I've posted a ton of argument and evidence. What do you think? I'm opening the blog to unrestricted comments.

Das Komisar

THE SERVANT OF POWER
There's a fundamental contradiction to PEN American Center. They're supposed to speak for the powerless. But, in this country, if you have no power PEN will not even acknowledge that you exist.

If I were Cormac McCarthy or Philip Roth they'd be rushing to help me and my compadres. But Roth and McCarthy don't need help. Not at all.

PEN's own genteel protests are in fact about advancing megaconglomerate power into every corner of the globe. PEN's every action can be gauged according to how it relates to power.

Witness Director Isenberg. Read his bio. Is he about anything but the attainment of position; of power?

Was Isenberg given his latest position to reform PEN-- or to squelch dissent and reform?

If this were the Soviet Union, Director Isenberg would be standing loyally behind Brezhnev on the Kremlin wall.

NO RESPONSE
Tom Hendricks and myself each sent emails to new Director Isenberg notifying him of the Petition to PEN. The door is open for dialogue. We've received no response.

Why haven't YOU joined the Protest? History celebrates the rebels; the trailblazers: the dissidents. Memory of the timid and the corrupt vanishes into dust.
www.penpetition.blogspot.com

For All Writers

THE VARIETY of signers of the Petition to PEN shows that it's for all writers-- ALL writers-- from the lowest to the highest. What it's really saying is this: "We writers are taking back control of our art."

PEN members THEMSELVES most of all need to join the cause, as they've lost control of their own organization.

Remember, we're the good guys.
www.penpetition.blogspot.com

Media Circus

GRANTED, it's difficult to interest people in the corrupt and grubby little world of literature against the Two-Minute Hate Orwellian Noise Campaign of the ongoing health care media show. In one corner, smooth-sounding Benevolent Big Brother Barack Obama. In the other, clinically insane drama queen Glenn Beck.

COMPETING PLUTOCRACIES
What's really happening is a war between media giants; GE/NBC/MSNBC and the Democratic Party their handpuppet versus Murdoch/News Corp/Fox and the Republican Party their handpuppet. It's a power struggle over spoils; a war over WHO is going to control the Machinery of Monopoly. On the fundamental questions there's little difference between the two camps. Okay, Republicans are Hard Imperialists and Democrats are Soft Imperialists, but NAFTA, WTO, and the Afghanistan bombing continue.

This is similar to the last days of the Roman Republic, when the political competition was between competing plutocrats, Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus, over WHO would control Rome's power and wealth. Real reform could never happen, because the Reformers would have to reform themselves.

I find it amusing to hear talk of a "government option," as if the government were independent, when it's owned and controlled by one gang or another of corporate plutocrats. This was proven over the past year when the corporate banking world turned the Treasury piggy bank upside down and emptied it into their own pockets.
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WHAT ABOUT PEN?
Actually, the Establishment power structure DOES still care, for whatever bizarre reason, about literature. This is proven by the appointment of one of their best, most loyal soldiers, one Steven L. Isenberg, as Exec Director of the PEN organization, which Once Upon a Time was run by writers themselves.

Can PEN allow real writer dissent against our nation's Power Structure when it IS (part of) the U.S. Power Structure?
http://www.penpetition.blogspot.com/
(That Mr. Isenberg resembles an old Roman plutocrat adds to the amusement.)

The Prisoner

Noted imprisoned writer Cassidy Wheeler is the latest to join the Petition to PEN at
http://www.penpetition.blogspot.com/
It was not easy getting him information on the protest. The facility he's at opens and screens all mail. They have a bureaucratic checklist of more than fifty reasons for rejecting correspondence. Nevertheless, a small information packet was eventually allowed through to him.

Cassidy signed immediately and mailed back the Petition. His name has been added to the list of literary heroes. At the same time, many hundreds of writers who aren't in prison have easy access to the Petition, and the reasons behind it. They can read it at will, at the click of a computer mouse, and have not signed. How many more rights do they have than Cassidy; how many more opportunities to speak out?-- for their own rights and for all writers' rights, yet they fail to do so.

We either use our democratic freedoms or lose them-- use our voices or see those voices marginalized, so that the only voices which remain are those for the rich and powerful-- as we've seen with the transformation of PEN the past twenty years. Plutocrats will have all the media, all the space, while our own room to maneuver in this society will be squeezed as tight as a prison cell.

The Petition to PEN is an affirmation of purpose; a statement of existence as citizens and writers. Please join our cause.

Posted at PEN

(Posted on a thread at PEN America Center's main blog, http://www.penamerica.blogspot.com/):

Here are facts for PEN's new Director to consider:
In 2001 the Underground Literary Alliance began bravely and openly documenting and exposing corruption in the literary world. Included in our reports were questionable grants to trendy writers like Rick Moody and Jonathan Franzen. We also looked into questions, originally raised by others, of plagiarism, and squelched articles.
In response the Eggers Gang (to competitors they behave like a gang) engaged in a several-year dirty tricks campaign against myself and the ULA. This has also been documented-- beginning with a 2004 New York Times article which revealed that Dave Eggers himself had been posting anonymous attacks against the ULA on Amazon.
As a lawyer, Mr. Isenberg knows the importance of evidence. The overwhelming mass of evidence is on our side of the issue.
********************
PEN's stonewalling raises questions about its integrity as an organization. I hope Mr. Isenberg cleans up the place. Until then, I'll continue documenting, and documenting, and documenting.
http://www.penpetition.blogspot.com/
August 7, 2009 10:56 AM

Gorbachev or Chernenko?

Here's bio info on PEN American Center's new Executive Director, Steven L. Isenberg:
www.pen.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/3734/prmID/170

The choice seems to indicate that the takeover of PEN by the establishment is complete. Steve Isenberg is as establishment as you can get. Is it fair to assume that he'll be a representative of money and power? I had hoped for a new face; forward-looking in attitude.

One interesting point in his resume: that he was President of the newspaper Newsday before it went under. He has to know that the world is changing-- and that literature needs to change also.

Will he reach out to the DIY movement? The door is open for him to do so. Continued stonewalling works for no one.
www.penpetition.blogspot.com
**************************************
I find it humorous to see PEN's talk supporting "free expression" in this country. There is no "free" expression in America. You have the expression you can pay for-- and so plutocratic aristocrats have more of it. Others are required to buy their way into the system in some manner; usually by accumulating credentials to prove your conformity to things-as-they-are. It's the road toward stagnation. Classic democracy presupposes equal access to speech: a level playing field. This is what an organization like PEN should be working toward. Lately they've been going in the other direction.

See other thoughts on this topic, "Ignorance," at
www.happyamericaliterature.blogspot.com

The Ultimate Suit?

I just got word that PEN American Center has named a new Executive Director, Steven Isenberg. Contrary to my hopes, he doesn't seem to have a background conducive to dissenting instincts. I hope I'm mistaken. His bio, laudable to some, to me is scary. I'll post it on this blog when I have more time.

That said, let's hope he reaches out to the Petition,
www.penpetition.blogspot.com
and establishes a dialogue-- or at least answers legitimate questions about the organization he's now running.

The Movement

Two points that have to be made.
1.) The underground literary movement is a legitimate literary movement.
2.) The movement is being stonewalled and suppressed because it's a movement; i.e., for ideological reasons.

STATIC OR DYNAMIC?
The movement needs to decide whether it's going to remain inert, as it's been since 2006, or if it can recapture its dynamism. One of my reasons for starting the Petition to PEN at
http://www.penpetition.blogspot.com/
is to help restart the literary rebellion's momentum. Many outstanding undergrounders have joined the protest-- the two most recent names among the more notable.

WHO'S WHO
The Petition is becoming a Who's Who of underground literary figures. The list shows the diversity of talent within the movement. Several more names remain to be added. There's no reason not to join. The Petition is an affirmation that there is, and needs to be, an underground literary movement.

WHAT'S NEEDED
It'd also be cool if writers who'd been tangentially part of the underground literary scene early in their careers, notably Thomas Frank, and who remain allegedly activist now, would join the protest.

INSURGENTS
Meanwhile, the privileged members of the narrow world of the literary establishment, from David Haglund to Patricia Cohen, have closed all doors to the Petition. There has not been one budged inch from them toward dialogue. THEY have defined us as beyond the pale, pariahs apart, unworthy of respect or notice; in so doing, creating an insurgency: a movement. We're insurgents in that we promote literary democracy, renewal, and change.

Conflicts of Interest

IT APPEARS that PEN American Center buys its immunity from criticism through its wining and dining of leading editors and journalists like David Remnick, Henry Finder, Adam Gopnik, Margo Jefferson, Patricia Cohen, and others. I hope these people can see the extent to which they're compromised right now.
*********************
If anonymous poster "Harland" is indeed Rick Moody, as now seems likely, then this throws light on the behavior of PEN staffers like David Haglund, given Moody's documented influence in the organization. PEN's impetus to shut down the whistleblower or dissenter then becomes comprehensible. Their behavior runs counter to PEN's mission-- but is the natural result of PEN's embrace of money and power.

FURTHER, if Rick Moody has engaged in anonymous attacks, then this adds to the record of dirty tricks carried out by his friends Dave Eggers and Daniel Handler against the ULA and myself, as has been well-documented. We have the outlines of a covert campaign to destroy a competitor. Such behavior is unethical, if not illegal.
*********************
As for PEN's David Haglund-- given that he's been published by The Believer, and given that he represents a regulated tax-exempt charity with obligations to the public, he needs to demonstrate SOME fairness and cease stonewalling the Petition to PEN's, and this blog's, legitimate questions.
www.penpetition.blogspot.com

The Real Failure

The noteworthy point about the literary establishment is its utter mediocrity. This is something I realized as far back as 2001, when at CBGB's in New York the Underground Literary Alliance destroyed the preppy Paris Review staff in debate.

Even when the System tries to be imaginative, as with HarperStudio, it's dependent on time-serving ticket-punchers-- apparatchiks-- who've made careers out of being unimaginative.

In its various aspects-- including HarperStudio; including PEN-- when encountering hard criticism and whistleblowing the System knows only how to stonewall, only how to exclude and block; to put tape over its eyes and cotton in its ears, black paper over its windows, to ensure it sees, hears, and knows nothing. "Don't tell me!" is the prevailing attitude.

Stonewalling-- the unwillingness or inability to engage-- is not the sign of a dynamic establishment but instead of a stagnant and frightened one. NONE of its bureaucratic occupants, from the highest Francine Prose/James Wood critic to the lowliest Murdoch HarperCollins staffer, is able to debate, which means having to think. They've lived in an airless room for so long without questioning or dissent that to let questions in now-- fresh air-- would turn the lot of them into dust.

DIY change is coming and coming fast. Some of the apparatchiks recognize this-- and so the desperate grasping of DIY language by desperate outfits like HarperStudio desperate to hold onto their control over writers.

If authentic DIYers were better able to network and work together they'd bring the house of cards down now.

The real failure lies with media watchdogs like the New Yorker; too part of a corrupt system to cover the corruption-- or stagnation-- at places like HarperStudio or PEN. And so these media giants risk their own Soviet Union-style collapse when the tidal wave of change finally hits them.
www.penpetition.blogspot.com

Literary Suicide

Creative writers of all stripes had best wake up at the news that TV celebrity Lauren Conrad has the best-selling novel in America. This is the explicitly anti-writer trend conglomerate publishing is following. It's no accident that Lauren Conrad is published by HarperCollins, which is also the force behind HarperStudio, whose stated mission is to publish celebrities.

For American literature this is suicide. It's the publishing conglomerates admitting they can't create their own stars, so they're going to borrow some from other realms. It's as if Indy Car racing, in its attempt to regain its once-lofty status, stopped developing talent like Danica Patrick and instead put TV personalities into its cars. For any business, any sport, any art, it's to become a joke.

Development of writing talent is what HarperStudio specifically doesn't want-- which is why it's stopped paying advances to writers, instead offering them a share of "profits." (Accounting no doubt done Hollywood-style by HarperCollins itself.) There's no thought of taking a loss on a couple books while building a writer's brand-- unless perhaps said author is independently wealthy, or willing to starve. The bottom line is all. Developing a novelist or poet, building their name and their audience, isn't wanted. This is considered old-fashioned according to HarperStudio's "Publishing on the Edge." (The edge of a cliff?) Instead: "Bring on the TV stars!"

That PEN American center is complicit in this should cause every PEN member, and every writer everywhere, to vomit.

(Underground writers may occasionally dress up like clowns, but we're also dedicated writers. HarperStudio has bypassed the writing part and gone directly to Ringling Brothers.)

www.penpetition.blogspot.com
A Protest for Authentic Radicals Only

The Fake Artaud

(First of Two Parts.)

OUR CIVILIZATION is the most sophisticated of all time. Its tricks go beyond the ability of commentators to catch them. Intellectuals-- historians, literary critics, political scientists-- are themselves bamboozled by the onslaught.

For instance, the ability of the Machine to quickly co-opt all dissent and difference-- to claim ownership for itself of every cultural happening and quirk.

If Imperial Rome had been that sophisticated, it would've co-opted the Jesus Movement by presenting a slicker alternative. Jesus without the edge. The replacement version would've been better-looking, more patrician-- more Roman-- would not have carried any anger, and not been so poor. He wouldn't have been crucified-- how gauche; what a loser-- and above all would've been pro-Imperial Rome.

Those doing the coopting today are today's patricians; our own Imperialists; indoctrinated and credentialed at the most prestigious schools, then given high positions in the highest academies or the conglomerates. The young priests live in a high-up realm from which they look down upon the rest of society. They don't comprehend this other world, but their insularity and arrogance assures them they do. The world is something the highest caste owns.

Young priestess Debbie Stier at HarperStudio, in the upper realms of publishing hierarchy, imagines herself to be an insurgent. Real literary insurgents of course are socially and economically crucified, eliminated from caste vision, they and their writings tossed into garbage dumpsters to be seen by no one. Stier easily steps into their role. She's oppressed and oppressor in one. It's the split identity of a comic book superhero. Debbie Stier is both INSIDE the towering office of power, on the 26th floor, and simultaneously OUTSIDE the building, on the streets, protesting herself. It's how her mind resolves the conflict generated by her station, by her power, by her main career role.

Another example of the phenomenon of high caste power is an essay by Rick Moody in that organ of Imperialist literature, The Believer: "Analects on the Influence of Artaud," in the June issue. Moody not only discusses Antonin Artaud, he identifies himself with him, as if he, Rick Moody, is the latter-day Artaud; or, at least, the leader of today's avant-garde. In his mind, Moody fully believes he is.

Are other latter-day Artauds mentioned? Kathy Acker perhaps? No.

Rick Moody explains to us how he came to become the new Artaud. It was in the academy; the illusion factory; at Columbia or Brown-- Moody doesn't specify which one. He's performing in an Artaud play there, for a course. In his enthusiasm-- rare enthusiasm (I've witnessed him read and saw no enthusiasm)-- Moody cuts his hand. This is his baptism into Artaud; his license to inhabit the role. As Moody tells us:

"It took a long while for the wound to heal. I was launched on the world. I was a graduate."

Now safely put into the superhero uniform of Antonin Artaud, because of a cut on his hand, in college, Moody is able, through agreement with the man's life and ideas, to further strengthen the identification.

The agreement, mind you, remains in the essay. Needless to say, Rick Moody isn't another Artaud. The idea is ludicrous. He's made his way in the lit-world by being as conformist and bourgeois as possible; gathering credential and credential, award after award; bonding with arts institution upon arts institution: becoming, beyond all else, APPROVED.
(To be continued.)

See a related essay now up at
www.happyamericaliterature.blogspot.com
and join the protest at
http://www.penpetition.blogspot.com/

Literary Monopoly

I intend to tie the remaining loose threads together and show that the current literary system is a monopoly which excludes critical and contrary voices. This monopoly is maintained through implicit control of literature's watchdogs, from PEN American Center to the New Yorker.

NEW YORKER FOLLIES
Can we expect the New Yorker to cover corruption at PEN, including the public charity's close relationship to the handful of media giants, when the New Yorker's leading editors and writers-- David Remnick, Henry Finder, Adam Gopnick-- are PEN members who attend PEN's swanky galas and participate at PEN events; who in many cases are published by the media giants, and in some instances (Steve Coll) are the recipients of PEN largesse?

HARPER STUDIO
The reason I'm hyper about HarperStudio and Burn This Book is because it marks the coopting/stealing/destruction of the underground brand by a monopolistic giant; an underground brand which was launched in 2001 with large ads in major publications like Village
Voice. The "ads" weren't paid for-- they were feature articles obtained through ballyhoo-- but they were ads, generated with a purpose, all the same.

Now we have the fake-DIY employees of a fake-DIY section of Harper-Collins/Murdoch gushing in mock-amazement ("Wow!) at the appearance of their fake-radical PEN book appearing on a shelf at an independent bookstore in Brooklyn, as if they were genuine impoverished undergrounders who did it on their own. Left unsaid is the fact that they and that book are backed by billions of dollars.

BOOKSTORES
Sweetheart deals cut by the media giants with the huge book chains Borders and Barnes & Noble is itself an important topic. Who's covering it?

DESTROYING THE UNDERGROUND
I've documented on this blog the actions of Daniel Handler and his apparent agents (Tao Lin; "Quilty10") to derail the underground cause. The motive was to squelch even the weak competition we offered.

STONEWALLING
The motive for PEN's stonewalling against questions and criticisms is the same: to shut out competition to things-as-they-are. What they've done, through their silence, is create an irrefutable record of bias and inaction. Someone should remind them they're a public organization, accountable to the public.

Who's giving PEN its marchingorders?
Is there enough here for anti-trust action?
www.penpetition.blogspot.com

The Surprise

It's amazing to me that I can present an overwhelming case for changing PEN American Center, bolstered by argument after argument after argument, and the entire organization continues to stonewall. At what point does one reach memories of integrity and conscience in them; the recognition of their own principles? They're monolithic stones. Their attitude toward criticism, toward free expression and debate, has gone beyond mere hostility, into immunity. Pathological unreachability, as if they're floating far away from other writers, above humankind; above the planet, far above, in the vicinity of Pluto. When I post a comment on one of their blogs, it's as if a switch is flipped turning off their minds. They become blind deafmutes. They see, hear, and speak nothing.

THEY have become the strongest argument proving the literary world's corruption.
www.penpetition.blogspot.com

(Happy Bastille Day! Long Live the Revolution.)

Reviews

I have three book reviews in the works, which I'll be posting either here or elsewhere. Stay posted. In the meantime, check out the recent posts at one of my other blogs,
www.happyamericaliterature.blogspot.com

PEN History

Here's PEN background from the 1990's, detailing the transformation which led to the condition the organization is now in. Not a good thing! (Note: these are to some extent establishment viewpoints, and the picture painted is still scary.)

www.nytimes.com/1996/01/24/arts/invite-in-the-rich-pen-is-pondering.html


www.nytimes.com/1997/03/12/arts/stung-by-dissident-a-divided-pen-ponders-its-role.html?.

www.villagevoice.com/1999-06-08/news/no-union-label-at-a-pen-gala/.

To work to turn this around, join the protest at
www.penpetition.blogspot.com

Book BCS

The U.S. Congress has held hearings about the college football BCS system; alleging that 90% of funds generated are monopolized by six conferences. Senator Hatch called the system "elitist."

How much more so is the lit-bizness, centralized in New York, monopolized by a handful of giant media conglomerates; and within the system, influence wielded chiefly by the graduates of a handful of east coast universities. When does Congress hold anti-trust hearings about this monopoly?

The problem is exacerbated by the actions of legal public charities like PEN American Center, whose charity is used to subsidize the multi-national giants. Most recently, this "charity," instead of seeking an arrangement with a true independent press (much less a radically indy press like the one run by the ULA), chose instead to have their book of allegedly dissident essays published by new boutique press HarperStudio, a fake-indy outfit run by Murdoch Media.

As kicker, HarperStudio seems to be aggressively anti-writer, in that
A.) it doesn't pay author advances;
B.) most of its authors are mass media celebrities.

Writers have become unnecessary in this scary "new" world of establishment publishing. Very uncomfortable, ya know, keeping around actual writers. . . .
www.penpetition.blogspot.com

Rationalizations

I've had some inklings at to the REASONS used to justify PEN's stonewalling; rationales to support established literature's blackballing. Judge how valid they are.

A.) I'M AKIN TO A SMELLY BUM OR A MADMAN.
It's true that someone would have to be mad to take on literature's totalitarians.

B.) THOSE WHO SIGN THE PETITION ARE AMBITIOUS.
Are writers ambitious for wanting to be heard? For expecting to be part of a democratic conversation by and about literature? A serious charge.

C.) I'VE USED A DISPARAGING TONE.
When you approach the Overdogs of Lit, do so with a submissive mien on your face and your hat in hand.

D.) PEN AMERICAN CENTER IS IMPOTENT.
This is strong argument for changing it.

E.) I'M NOT A WRITER
The quickest way to exclude writers you disagree with is to designate them "not writers."

F.) MY ARGUMENTS ARE UNPERSUASIVE.
The arguments are persuasive enough that they have to be stonewalled. Any argument becomes unpersuasive when it's censored; when it's not heard.

There must be other rationales for PEN's stonewalling. We don't know what they are, because PEN's staffers and bloggers aren't talking.
www.penpetition.blogspot.com