Talk To Me From Wnyc

While PEN is often at the forefront of debates and initiatives to do with the more obvious forms of oppression against writers — isolation, censorship, imprisonment — it is also ready to tackle the more subtle deterrents that plague the publishing industry as a whole. In a panel at the Standard Hotel as part of the PEN World Voices Festival, writers and editors talked about the ways in which corporate publishing limited access to audiences, the pressure to mainstream, and editing as a form of censorship. The evening was moderated by Mischief + Mayhem co-founder Lisa Dierbeck, who fueled debate by "impersonating" a corporate publishing executive and goaded her panelists ("the enemy") to confirm that they planned to overthrow her world. Speakers included writers Carmen Boullosa, Dale Peck (also a co-founder of Mischief + Mayhem), Mkola Riabchuk, and Monika Zgustova; writer and editor Ben Greenman, and Feminist Press editor Amy Scholder. The independent tone was set early in the evening by critic Eric Banks. A