Laurel Zuckerman's Paris Weblog

Peter Carey's Lessons On Cultural Arrogance

The award-winning Australian novelist Peter Carey used his literary fame and influence to denounce Pen American's decision to honor Charlie Hebdo cartoonists and writers who were murdered by Islamists in the heart of Paris.

Citing "PEN's seeming blindness to the cultural arrogance of the French",  Carey encouraged other writers to condemn the award for the French satirists.

Paris Writers News would like to ask Peter Carey some questions

Films about faith: Christopher Norris on the unique Insight Film Festival

The Insight Film Festival is unique: it seeks to discover and showcase a wide diversity of films about faith and to support young filmmakers. Such is the quality of many of the films submitted that one of its laureates was nominated for an Oscar.  

At the  2015 London Book Fair, I had the good fortune to meet  Christopher Norris, Editor and Development Executive of the  Insight Film Festival, and to talk with him about the history, aims and achievements of this remarkable film event.

Christopher Norris, Editor and Development Executive, Insight Film Festival

a Paris Writers News interview

Ideological French school reform forgets children, learning, languages, excellence

Schools in France have, for years, suffered from four terrible failures:

1) Inability to help students who are identified as fragile, or weak, or in need of help from their youngest years - thus perpetuating and even exacerbating social inequalities

2) Insufficient teacher training, both initially and as part of continuing education due in part to the preference for investing scarce resources into SELECTION instead of into training (I wrote about this, with as much humor as possible, in Sorbonne Confidential)

3) Failure to replace teachers who are absent in middle school and lycée, which leads to students losing ONE WHOLE YEAR of learning due to absent teachers who are not replaced as well as too few adults in the school.

4) Persistently poor results in foreign language learning, compared to other European countries

This is, of course, just a short list. And (since it is focused on failures) it does not mention the many successes.

The reason I mention it is to provide context for the current battle over what's called the "collège" (middle school) reform.

The first three points - all critical - are not dealt with at all. And the last point (languages) is deliberately made worse: the one thing that worked well will be destroyed.

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145 Writers Against Freedom of Speech

Following the lead of Francine Prose, Michael Ondaatje, Peter Carey and Teju Cole, the 145 writers below signed a letter protesting the PEN award for "courage and freedom of expression" to Charlie Hebdo, the French satirical magazine whose staff was massacred by Islamists in Paris in January.

We "don't believe in censoring expression" they write, BUT  we are against "rewarding" "expression that violates the acceptable".  

Violates the acceptable? What can this possibly mean? In this exclusive interview, the Letter explains itself.

Q&A with a Letter 

a Paris Writers News interview

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PWN: What do you mean by "expression that violates the acceptable"?

Letter: It is expression that might offend someone who we consider to be "marginalized, embattled and victimized".

President of SOS Racism: "Charlie Hebdo is anti-racist"

"Scandalous." "An insult to the memory" "An insult to the living and to the dead."

This is Dominique Sopo, the president de SOS Racisme, France's leading anti-racism and anti-discrimination organisation. In this video (in French) he expresses his  outrage that people falsely accuse Charlie Hebdo of being racist when it is the opposite. He says that Charlie Hebdo is the most important anti-racist weekly in France. That all the anti-racism activists in France know this, and that Cabu, Charb and Wolinski regularly did cartoons FOR anti-racist campaigns.  Mr Sopo says that lies about Charlie Hebdo are creating a "mob mentality". 

(Even if you don't understand French, you can hear from Mr Sopo's tone how angry he is that ignorant morons attack Charlie Hebdo for "racism". )

I don't know how exactly the moral brigade among writers in America got the idea that the fearless satirists of Charlie Hebdo were "racist", but it's simply not true. If you have been spreading these lies you should be ashamed of yourself for slandering the dead and the living.

Writers who don't understand the video might pause for a moment to think of the implications of this.

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For more of my blog posts on related topics, please see:

145 Writers Against Freedom of Speech?

Garry Trudeau's Shame

 

 

Read first, pay what you want: Bartlomiej Filipek on new publishing options

One of the great pleasures of the London Book Fair is discovering innovative approaches to publishing, marketing, and distributing books and ebooks. Thus I was delighted to meet Bartlomiej Filipek, the General Manager of OpenBooks.com which proposes a new business model for ebooks, designed to facilitate sharing and discovery. Books are openly shared and readers pay, if they want to, after reading -  an amount they fix themselves. Could this be the model for you?

London Book Fair Special: a talk with Bartlomiej Filipek, General Manager of OpenBooks.com,

a Paris Writers News interview

Garry Trudeau's Shame

I loved Garry Trudeau's Doonesbury.

As a teenager I couldn't wait to read his comic strips and bought all his books.

I thought he was brilliant. Speaking truth to power.

Now, in a disturbing - and very sad - turn of events, this once admirable satirist has shamed himself and his profession.

In a speech delivered on the occasion of an award for lifetime achievement, Trudeau blamed the victims in the Charlie Hebdo attack, ignored the very real risk of death that satirists - as well as many other people - face from Islamists today, and advocated self-censorship to avoid offending people.

Paris Hidden Literary Gem: Maison de la Poésie

Where else in Paris can you listen to an intimate conversation, in English and in French, with Dave Eggers, the brilliant and generous editor, publisher, activist, educator, and author of such works as What is the What, Zeitoun, The Circle, Hologram for a King (recently translated into French) and, of course A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius?

Paris Writers know, of course, of the American Library in Paris, Shakespeares, the Irish Cultural Center, Carrs, the Abbey Bookshop, WICE, the Mona Bismarck and many other outstanding venues. But the Maison de la Poésie is, despite its excellence and fame within the French writers community, much less well known among English-speaking writers.

It is a place to discover.

After Dave Eggers, (wonderfully interviewed by Flore Vasseur and with outstanding translation by Marguerite Capelle), tonight the Maison de la Poésie will welcome Michael Cunningham, the author of the beautiful The Hours and The Snow Queen, which has recently been translated into French.

It promises to be another outstanding event.

Personally, I took out a membership (a very reasonable 20 euros) and plan to attend every event I can.

Adding to the pleasure, wine is for sale by the glass in the foyer, and the seats of the auditorium are comfortable.  

Maison de la Poésie

Passage Molière
157, rue Saint-Martin - 75003 Paris
M° Rambuteau - RER Les Halles

Infos et réservations

tél : 01 44 54 53 00
du mardi au samedi de 15h à 18h

[email protected]

March Literary Events in Paris

Paris Writers News is gearing up for a new season of literary events and interviews with authors.

In the meantime, for information about what's on in Paris, we recommend:

• Jen Dick's excellent listing of literary events and workshops for March,

http://parisreadingsmonthlylisting.blogspot.fr/2015/02/literary-paris-calendar-march2015-part.html

Copenhagen: five weeks after Paris and Vincennes

In the heart of Europe, cartoonists, free speech advocates and Jews are under attack again. Our hearts are with the people of Denmark, and all who struggle to defend the values of a democratic, open, and tolerant society.