Criticism

On the closing day of PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature, I had front row seats to listen to two giants of the literary world, Harold Bloom and Wole Soyinka. Both events took place in the exquisite Beaux-Arts Celeste Bartos Forum at that temple of the book, the New York Public Library. First up, From Anxiety to the Anatomy of Influence, where Paul Holdengräber picked the octogenarian mind of the often controversial Harold Bloom.

Editor's note: The following is Morris Dickstein's opening remarks given at the PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature panel, "The Next Decade in Book Culture." You can read my write-up of the event here. You can learn more about Morris Dickstein and his critical and historical writings here. My sincere gratitude for sharing this text with The Mantle. Enjoy!

by Morris Dickstein

Day three of PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature. Event number four for me, at a fourth location. One of the joys of this weeklong event is discovering new and unusual places. So far I’ve been in the sexy Standard Hotel, the very cool Chelsea Lighthouse, an old gymnasium in Little Italy, and now the charming Greenwich House Music School—all new to me. Looking ahead, I’m scheduled to cover six more events in six more locations. Variety is the spice of life, and of PEN World Voices!

The Austrian Cultural Forum (ACF) is eye-catching. The building’s zigzags penetrating and receding from the brick facades vertically paving 53^rd St. Manhattan exudes a bit of swagger. This afternoon, I finally had the pleasure of exploring the tantalizingly narrow building, to listen in on the workings of the critical mind. My adventure through PEN World Voices Festival 2010 continued, but this time I heard from the critics, rather than the writers.