I received this email from PEN and felt compelled to share it with you:

Dear Friends,

As you have heard, the Chinese government has sentenced our colleague Liu Xiaobo to 11 years in prison in China.

Tomorrow’s press event/rally to protest the conviction of Liu Xiaobo in China will take place ON THE FRONT STEPS OF THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY, 42nd Street at 5th Avenue, at 11:00 a.m.

We believe this is both a good way to underscore PEN’s commitment to this case and to ring in a year that marks the 50th anniversary of PEN’s organized efforts to defend imprisoned and persecuted writers around the world.

Please join us for this important show of solidarity.

The event will take place at 11 a.m. at a convenient midtown Manhattan location—we will e-mail final details tomorrow. We will gather at the location at 10:45 a.m., and we will have posters of Liu Xiaobo available for all PEN Members to hold during the event, which will include very short readings from Liu’s work and statements by Anthony Appiah and other PEN board members.

More details on the program appear below. Can you please let us know as soon as possible if you can join us for this event? Please RSVP to lara@pen.org, and plan on arriving at 10:45 a.m. to gather together. If you are not in New York City, and would like to hold an event in your area, please contact us for information and materials.

Many thanks, and all best wishes for the New Year,

K. Anthony Appiah
Steve Isenberg
Larry Siems

This Thursday, New Year’s Eve, PEN will hold an outdoor press event in midtown Manhattan to demand the release of Liu Xiaobo, who was sentenced on Christmas Day to 11 years in prison for his writings in China.

The press event will feature several prominent Members of PEN American Center reading short passages from Liu’s work. The event begins promptly at 11 a.m. and will last about ½ hour.

The event rings in a year that marks the 50th anniversary of PEN’s activism on behalf of writers who are jailed or face persecution because of their work. Joseph Brodsky, Wole Soyinka, Vaclav Havel, Jose Revueltas, Pramoedya Ananta Toer, Alicia Portnoy, Salman Rushdie, Orhan Pamuk, and Taslima Nasreen, are just a few of the hundreds of writers PEN has freed or defended over the years.

There are currently almost 1,000 writers on PEN’s list of writers and journalists in danger because of their work. Leading the list is Liu Xiaobo, one of China’s most prominent writers and a past president and member of the Independent Chinese PEN Center, which is doing on-the-ground PEN advocacy in China. Liu was convicted of “inciting subversion of state power” for co-authoring “Charter 08,” a petition calling for political and human rights reforms in China, and for seven sentences in five articles he published on the internet that are critical of Chinese authorities.

PEN American Center President Kwame Anthony Appiah called his 11-year sentence “a scandal” and “a mockery,” and PEN Members around the world have vowed to step up efforts to win his release.

Mr. Bill Canegata, Sixth Dan Black Belt, passed away yesterday, December 9, 2009, exactly three years to the day after Anna Bahceci, George Wimpfheimer, and I passed our Black Belt tests.

Mr. Bill lived with cancer for many years. He was a man of great strength who knew how to control pain and discomfort. He never complained. Though Mr. Bill could no longer instruct us, he still showed up at the do-jang every day and watched us progress toward our Black Belts. He gave us advice and helped us with our forms. He came to our promotion test and sat and watched, calm and still as a boulder. When the test was over, he presented us with our new Black Belts and tied them around our waists.

In 1996, my childhood friend Sandra Isham Vreeland died of AIDS after living with HIV for close to fifteen years. She contracted the disease after receiving a blood transfusion. She had two children, and fought to stay alive for them. She died on my birthday, August 5th. I drove out to Sagaponack, LI, for her memorial service. Her mother, Sheila, was also a good friend of mine and I approached her and murmured that I felt horrible that Sandra had died on my birthday. Sheila looked at me with her penetrating, calm blue eyes and said that there could be no greater honor. “After such a long fight,” she said, “she chose your birthday to let go and finally find peace. That was her birthday gift to you.” Sheila probably never knew the enormous impact her words had on me. What amazed me most was that she was able to offer such comfort when she herself must have been in an agony of grief. But Sheila always believed in a power greater than all of us, in some kind of greater meaning and other planes of existence that we cannot perceive. I decided at that moment that I would try to look at death the way Sheila did, and not the way I was taught to, which was with terror and fear.

There is most definitely a weird synchronicity at play in my life. My father’s best friend, Willie Morris, was buried on my birthday in 1999. My godfather, Buddy Bazelon, passed away a few days before my birthday and on the night of August 5th, 1995, we were sitting shiva in my godmother’s apartment. One week later, Kevin and I got married. Thanks to Sheila Isham, I chose to accept these moments as an honor, rather than some kind of punishment, or karmic retribution.

So it seems only appropriate that Mr. Bill would leave us on December 9th, the day Anna, George, and I passed our Black Belt test. Almost everyone we started with, even those who went on and tested for their Black Belts, have left the do-jang. Not us. We persevere. Not in small part because of Mr. Bill and his courage, and the way he taught us to show up, even when we were sad, or sick, or in emotional pain.

In fact, I think I’ll suit up and go today. Spend an hour with Mr. Luis Sevilla, who replaced Mr. Bill as our instructor, and went at least twice a week to visit Mr. Bill in his last months. Another wonderful, honorable man.

A High School Student’s Response to LIES MY MOTHER NEVER TOLD ME

I just received the following letter from a fifteen year old student in Illinois. I was so moved by it I thought I’d share it with you. Jessica is a brave young woman and I’m amazed by the candor and honesty of her letter. I wish I’d been this self-aware and fifteen.

“Dear Kaylie Jones,

“In today’s world, there are so many setbacks and obstacles in life that it is difficult to maintain the feeling that “it’ll all work out in the end.” There are many things that make me doubt that I am strong enough to deal with the curve balls thrown at me and to cope with the cards I am dealt.
The challenges that we are faced with, or rather, the manner in which we deal with them, is what shapes our character and defines what sort of people we are. As I reflect on your memoir, I see the reckless and defiant girl who began drinking early in life profoundly changed by the end of the book after she has stayed sober for nearly twenty years and has had a child to be responsible for. The challenge you had to overcome was alcoholism. Mine is diabetes.
I have had this disease since I was ten years old, and my father has always told me that I haven’t fully accepted it, to which I have always answered him, “Of course I have; that’s crazy.” Only, I didn’t admit that it was a problem. No, everything was just fine – I thought it was no big deal to skip medicine here and there, or not check my blood sugars because I didn’t feel like it at the moment. But whether I admitted it or not, my poor control of my diabetes was affecting me – blurry vision, sick days, etc. But all along, my frame of mind was, “Well, I’m still alive, so it isn’t really a problem. …”
Something had to change, or things would get even worse. However, as I realized while reading your memoir, you cannot deal with a problem until you have accepted that there is one. As that famous Alcoholics Anonymous prayer says: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”
I don’t truly know who I am yet. My life is just beginning, brand new and full of potential and possibility. I cannot control diabetes – I don’t know why I got it, and I can’t get rid of it. But I can control my diabetes. I can take the medicine. I can check the blood sugars. I can make healthier choices. Just as the young woman realizes in your memoir, I don’t want to leave this world with any regrets about not making a different choice … a better one. I want to lead a life that anyone could look back on with pride and satisfaction.
Because of your book, I underwent a process. I have accepted that I cannot change the fact that I have an illness; but I will maintain the courage to keep fighting it every day. The effect it has on me can change. Reading your memoir has given me hope and the wisdom to know that I can control how to become the kind of person I want to be.”

–Jessica Elliott

Ever since I got back from my book tour about two weeks ago, I’ve been in an emotional slump, a kind of low-grade depression that makes my limbs and heart feel heavy. I am not exactly sure what has caused it. Probably a combination of things.

Since the publication of my book at the end of August, I’ve been away from home more than I’ve been here and I missed almost all of my daughter’s first semester of 7th grade. Yet, on the road I made many new friends and learned a lot about my country’s history and culture (having been raised in France through most of high school, I never had a really good grasp on American history and tradition). I loved being in Oklahoma, in Georgia, in Tennessee. I loved spending time with other writers at book festivals and fund raising events. I especially enjoyed spending a week in my dad’s home state, Illinois, with old friends who are the closest thing to family I have. In Champaign-Urbana, at the university, I met an 88 year old WWII veteran who healed his emotional war wounds and gave his life meaning by playing in an army jazz band in occupied Japan after the war. He gave free concerts to the local Japanese population, and ended up teaching wind instruments to Japanese children until he went home when his time was up.

But back in New York, with the holidays fast approaching, I felt overcome by helplessness. I am helpless to give my daughter the big family she craves. We are three – my husband, Eyrna, and me. That’s it. My husband’s mother is not speaking to us because she was offended and mortified by one paragraph in my book that alluded to my husband’s troubled childhood in a home poisoned by alcoholism. I had thought she was accepting of this fact; I had thought she understood the ramifications and repercussions of what her sons had suffered through as children. I was wrong. In fact, it was my husband who insisted I deal with the topic head-on in my memoir. It was my husband who insisted I write the truth; after all, it was his childhood, it was his suffering I was writing about. This was our story; a kind of upside-down love story about how two damaged people in their early 30’s, two Adult Children of Alcoholics, loved each other enough to confront their fears of commitment and intimacy. It took a lot of work, but worth every minute. But one thing we can’t change, the one thing we can’t fix, is the decimation of our families – the fact that we are alone. On the holidays, we are three.

Earlier this month, I spent two days at a symposium with the writer Tim O’Brien, a veteran of Vietnam. He went to the war because he was drafted, an average young man with no special talent or desire for war. But he was afraid to humiliate his family, especially his father, who was a veteran himself. All his life Tim O’Brien has wanted his father to approve of him, to understand him. Now, at age 63, he is a father for the first time, with two small sons, 4 and 6, whom he loves to distraction. This new development, fairly late in his life, has left him with a stunned look. The devotion and overwhelming love he feels for his boys has come as an utter shock to him. He is a changed man. He sees meaning where he used to see none. Now, his greatest worry is his age; that he will not be there for his boys when they reach adulthood; that he will not be there to counsel them and offer them the unconditional love he himself has never known.

I went to see my former Taekwondo master, Mr. Bill, last Tuesday. He is clinging to life by a thin, silvery thread. I try to see him at least once a week, but that was hard while I was on the road. I bring him lunch, sushi platters or Chinese delicacies. On the mornings of the days I plan to visit him, I am gripped by anxiety, by discomfort, by fear. I never can be sure of his condition. This fear is dispelled the minute I arrive at his warm, cozy apartment, which smells of the pine candles he burns. While his earthly body disintegrates, his aura seems to grow stronger and stronger, so that he practically glows. I never much believed in auras and any kind of physical manifestation of the spirit, but I do now. Mr. Bill used to have a walker to get from his armchair to the dining table, a question of a few feet, but now he is on prednisone, a steroid drug used mostly by arthritis patients. It gives him the shakes, but at least he can walk.

We sit across from each other at the small dining table and talk while we eat. He says this is only one realm of existence. He says death is in fact just a transition. He says the spirit is an arrow and when it is released, it is fired straight into God, which is the Center of all things. He will become one with the Universe, of this he is sure. But, he confesses, he still has moments of overwhelming fear. On Tuesday he said, “I’ve been afraid my whole life.”

I met him when he was in perfect physical condition, a Sixth Dan Black Belt at the Richard Chun Taekwondo School. He taught me from my first day, all the way through my Black Belt test. Even though he had cancer and was in great pain, he showed up. He showed up and taught us until he couldn’t anymore. Then he showed up and sat and watched while another master took the class. Then, finally, he could only muster up the strength to come to the dojang once a week. Now, we go to him. We take turns, or go in pairs.

“I’ve been afraid my whole life.” This was hard for me to ingest. He seemed so strong, so fearless. Someone who could recognize the truth from bullshit a mile away. He told me something I really never knew: The best years of his life were the five years he played minor league baseball, first in New Jersey, then down south. This was the old south of racism and segregation, where he could not sleep in the same hotel as his white teammates.

What he didn’t have, what the major league players have that he didn’t have, he said, was stamina. What he could do in the first inning, these guys can still do in the ninth. That was the difference. That is the difference between being average, and being truly great.

“You have an inquisitive mind,” he told me, “your mind is going all the time, asking questions.” I told him that very questioning is making it hard for me to live in a state of serenity. Worrying about the future, obsessing about the past, what I should’ve done differently. How I’m terrified about money; how I know I need a bigger apartment for my daughter, who is growing up and needs privacy. I think I am failing as a parent, because I can’t supply the things she thinks she wants.

“All you need to do is accept that everything is exactly as it is meant to be. All that judging of yourself, it serves no purpose. The only thing that matters is right now, this moment.”

And because I believe him, because he has honored me with the intimate and personal sharing of his slow, painful slipping away, in that moment, I feel nothing but peace and serenity. Unfortunately, by the next morning, I’m back to my low-grade depression, to my worrying about the future, and agonizing over the choices I’ve made in the past.

So today is Thanksgiving. I called Mr. Bill this morning and thanked him for allowing me to be a part of his life. For his words of wisdom that fill me with hope and awe. For our Thanksgiving feast, there will be three of us in our apartment that is too small. And so what? My life is full of love.

My friend Ray Elliott took me to his Wednesday morning Marine breakfast at Sammy’s in Champaign, IL. They stood up and clapped, even though my father was regular Army. I told them that one of my dad’s best friends, Eddie Morgan, had been a Marine. He’d joined at 17 and was part of the First Marine Division that landed on Guadalcanal in August 1942. Eddie always told my dad that what my dad had done was nothing — the Army came in after the Marines for a “clean-up” operation on Guadalcanal, a mere garden party compared to what the Marines had been through. One guy at the end of the table called out that his uncle had been there at Schoffield Barracks, just like my dad, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.

“The 25th Infantry Division,” I said. (I know my stuff).

Ray told me that the fellow to my left, Keith Eveland, was with the First Marine Division in Korea. The plates started arriving, each heaped so high with eggs, bacon, sausage, home fries, they could’ve fed an entire platoon. When Keith’s breakfast arrived he opened up the pepper shaker and dumped half the contents onto his eggs.

“Why don’t you just get the hot sauce from down the table?” I asked him.

“Don’t want to press my luck.”

When it was time to leave, he said, “We’re proud of you for what you’ve done with your legacy.”

From my friend and tae kwon do buddy, Denise Brecher:

“My daughter quoted you in school today. They had someone come to school to talk to students about chemical dependency. The man who spoke to Jamie’s class said that in his family the word “alcoholic” was only used on drunk homeless people on the street. He said that because this he never recognized that he was an alcoholic until he was 33. Jamie raised her hand and told the counselor that Kaylie Jones said the same thing in her memoir LIES MY MOTHER NEVER TOLD ME. The counselor said that he was always looking for books on these issues and he was going to go out and buy it.”

Thank you, Jamie Brecher. I love that kids talk so openly about this stuff. I love that Jamie’s mom let her read my book. There is no greater honor.

Upon finishing my memoir after I met with this high school AP English class, one student writes:

In the book, near the end, your mother was doing very badly, and you wrote that you were waiting for her to die and you questioned how much longer your mother would hold on to her behavior. When I was reading that part, I started wondering when Gloria would die as well. Not that I wished her death, but she treated you so poorly that I was just waiting for her to die. That sounds awful, but it’s true. I know this isn’t a question, more of a reflection that I don’t think anyone else would understand.

I understand all too well what you’re saying here. We are taught in our society, as in most societies, that we must love, honor and respect our parents. Of course we should love, honor and respect our parents. But it should also be understood that parents should love, honor and respect their children. If I don’t honor and respect my child, do I deserve her love and respect? I don’t think so. I work very hard at being a good parent, and respecting my daughter’s feelings and needs. That includes setting down rules and discipline, and consistent behavior. In our society, it is considered a sin to have strong feelings of animosity toward our parents. So of course we will feel terribly guilty, we will feel ashamed, for having antagonistic feelings toward our parents. I am glad that you felt the way you did reading that part of the book. It means I got my point across. That was the extremes to which I was emotionally pushed: I was pushed to the point that I wished my mother’s death. I no longer feel any remorse or guilt about this in the least.

From the rest of the class, I received the following questions:

Would you prefer to live in Europe or the US?
I love visiting Paris, where I grew up. I love staying there for several weeks at a time. But eventually, I miss the States and want to come home. New York is home for me now. I’ve lived here since 1981, and so far, it’s the only place I’ve found where I feel totally at home. That is because you can walk down the street with bright green hair and no one will glance at you twice. That is New York.

If you could go back and change anything about your life, what would it be?
This is a terribly difficult question. Of course, I would say that I would change the fact that my father died so young, at 55. He never got to finish his last book; he never got to see his children grow up or meet his grandchildren. But then, if he had lived, I would not be who I am today. Every single thing that has happened to me in my life has led me to this very place, right now, writing answers to these unbelievably perceptive and moving questions.

If my dad had lived, I would not have become a writer. I would not have quit drinking. I would not have met my wonderful husband, nor had my daughter. And I wouldn’t trade any of those things for all the fortunes of the world. And now I’m sitting here all choked up.

When you were a child, did you realize the influence that the novelists around you would have on you?
Believe it or not, I had no idea how important they were! I knew they were “famous,” but what did that really mean? Not much to me, as a kid. When I went to college and saw most of their names on my 20th century literature reading lists, I practically fell over! I wish I hadn’t been so self-centered as a teenager, that I’d listened to their conversations more. But things like literature didn’t matter very much to me when I was 15 or 16 years old. I was much too concerned about boys and parties and how to fit in.

If you could choose to have a “normal” mother, knowing that it would change who you are today, would you?
When I stand back and think about my life, I am overwhelmed with gratitude for the things I now have. Knowing what I know now, I have to say, no. I wouldn’t change a thing. But it’s impossible to say what kind of person I would have been if I’d had a different kind of mother. It’s impossible to say if I would have become a teacher and a writer. Being a teacher, a writer, but also a mom and a wife — I feel that my life is filled with joy and light.

Did knowing major writers influence your perception of their work, like when you met Capote?
This is a very perceptive and interesting question, more so than you probably know. When I teach literature now, I teach the life of the writer of the book as well as the book itself. I think the writer’s outer and inner lives are crucial components of his or her work. Many teachers and critics don’t agree with this approach. But for me, knowing that, for example, Dostoevsky was a starving student, freezing in his garret room, who seriously considered murdering a cruel old pawnbroker who lived down the street (he’d even counted the steps to her door) – well, that changes my whole perception of Crime and Punishment. Knowing that Truman Capote had strong feelings for one of those young men who murdered an entire family in cold blood, I understand the enormity of the accomplishment it was for him to write that book. I understand why he had a nervous collapse and never quite recovered from it.

What would you do if you weren’t a writer?
I think I would still be a teacher of literature. That is the only thing I know how to do – teach.

Did you ever wish your family wasn’t famous so you wouldn’t be compared to your father?
No. I am very proud of my father and that I am his daughter. I think his work is worth fighting for, and I have never once wanted to be anyone else’s daughter.

Do you think you have an addictive personality? If so, did you simply replace alcohol with something like how you replaced the nosespray when you were a child?
Yes, I definitely have an addictive personality. And yes, nose spray was one of my first addictions as a child. Also, pastries! I loved French pastries. They made me feel comforted when I was little. And I do believe, without treatment and help, addicts replace one addiction with another: food, sex, sports, etc … I am probably addicted to my martial arts classes. But that isn’t a bad addiction, I don’t think. It seems pretty constructive to me. I’ve learned mental discipline, body strength, and courage from tae kwon do. And because my daugther is also a Black Belt, it is something we share, something we do together.

What made you do cocaine?
In the 80’s, when I was in college and just after, this was a very popular drug. No one knew how dangerous or addictive it was. During my years in college and my early years living in New York, I sometimes used it, if it was offered to me at a party. But I used it very little, and very rarely. I liked it because it allowed me to drink more without falling over or making a fool of myself! Now I realize how stupid and foolish it was, because it is a very dangerous and addictive drug. One of my friends had a heart attack from cocaine! I feel very lucky that I didn’t become addicted to cocaine or other drugs.

Did traveling with your family a lot as a child make you feel like you never had a home?
No. Traveling was great. What I felt was that I wasn’t quite one thing or the other, having American parents but growing up in France. I wasn’t quite French; but then, when we came to the States to visit, I never felt quite American either. That is no longer the case. I am 100% American! The first time I realized this was when I landed at JFK after spending 6 months back in Paris during my Junior year of college. When I saw the American policemen, I was overwhelmed by a feeling of safety and comfort. I cried out to one of them, “I’m so happy to be home!” And he said, “Well then, welcome home, honey.”

When you read to or with your daughter, are you hoping to recreate positive experiences you had with your father?
Both my father and mother read aloud to us. There is something really great about hearing a story read aloud. In fact, I didn’t read to my daughter nearly enough. She has become such a big reader herself that she doesn’t need me to read to her anymore. I did read her 5 out of the 7 Harry Potter books aloud, though. That was great fun. I don’t know that I consciously hoped to recreate my own positive childhood experiences, but I do think all parents should read to their children because the experience of sharing a story creates such a wonderful bond between people. She and I will never forget that we shared those Harry Potter books together. I just hope she doesn’t want to be a writer! It’s much too hard and unstable a life! )

Amazing Questions from A High School Student about Memoir Writing:

I visited my former student Tom Borthwick’s high school AP English class in Scranton, PA, and spoke to them about writing. They later read my memoir and wanted to ask me more questions. These are from a lovely young woman who recently lost her father in an alcohol-related car accident:

What resources do you need to write a memoir?
You don’t need anything but your memories. That is what the word memoire means in French: memory. But it’s always good to keep a daily notebook with dates and even times. Keeping track of important events, and taking photographs, or looking through old photographs, helps too.

Did your mother’s friends know about her alcoholism?
This is an incredibly perceptive question. Yes. And no. Many of her friends drank the way she did. Many of them were able to cut back. Many died from complications from alcoholism. In the end, they must have known. But denial is a very, very powerful human condition. I can’t imagine what was going on inside their minds, can only interpret their actions. Several of them maintain to this day that she was absolutely fine. What can I do with that??

Do you think it’s hard to overcome addictions?
I think it’s very hard. The hardest thing is doing it alone, without faith, and without a network of people who understand. Many alcoholics or drug addicts are clinically depressed, or anxious, and they need help stopping. I think the drugs and alcohol are a way that people self-medicate to ease the psychological pain they feel. The hardest thing is accepting defeat, realizing one is addicted, then making the decision to stop.

Do you think an addictive personality is genetic?
Yes, I definitely do. The gene that causes addiction may remain dormant, however. It depends on environmental issues. If a child is raised in an alcoholic home, with active alcoholics, chances are, the gene will be “fired,” or “lit.” If a child, however, is raised in a home with sober alcoholics, and learns coping skills, maybe s/he will have a chance at a normal life. My daughter is growing up in a sober home, and we won’t know for a while whether or not her genetic predisposition will affect her reaction to alcohol. At least she’s armed with the knowledge that she may not react well to alcohol. And she hopefully will have the emotional coping skills she’ll need to get through conflict and pain without the need to self-medicate.

Do you have any regrets regarding your mother?
Wow. What a perceptive, adult question. The only thing I regret is that I was not better able to handle my own anger and resentment toward her. I was not able to fully incorporate the notion that she was sick. I blamed her for her own alcoholism, for her inability to take responsibility for her actions. I blamed her for hurting my daughter. If I had been less emotionally involved, I would have been able to handle the situation better.

Did you have any friends or boyfriends to lean on when your father died?
Yes, I did. I had some truly wonderful friends who are friends still. I had Lee, who was my best friend since third grade. I had Lawrence, who died recently of a brain tumor. I also had Joanne, who has been my friend since my freshman year of college. I had my brother, who was devastated himself, but he was like a pillar to lean on. I did have a boyfriend, but he was less able to help, because my pain and shock over losing my dad affected my ability to be emotionally available and open to him. So he reacted badly. Our relationship ended badly. I think when we’re in that kind of pain, so young, it is very hard to have an emotional commitment at that level. Better to wait a while.