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The theme of the Happy Ending event at Joe's Pub on November 10th was dreams and ambitions. Jennifer Egan, Julia Holmes and Teddy Wayne read from their new novels, which offer unconventional views of success, explore what it means, and consider whether success can make us happy.

In the latest episode of KGB's non-fiction reading series, Dan Charnas read from his forthcoming book "The Big Payback: The History of the Business of Hip-Hop." Charnas' book, out next month, examines how hip-hop originated in the ghettos of 1970s New York to become one of the world's predominant pop-culture as well as a multi-billion dollar businesses. Also at KGB, Sara Marcus read from her book "Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrl Movement Revolution." The book tells the brash story of the early '90s music and feminism that became the Riot Grrl movement.

Lady Antonia Fraser recently took the New York Public Library (NYPL) stage elegantly poised and eager to spellbind the audience with tales from her memoir, "Must You Go? My Life with Harold Pinter."

When it comes to things that go bump in the night, or things that bump each other off in the night, Otto Penzler is the man. The proprietor of The Mysterious Bookshop purveys classic and contemporary crime novels, chillers, and thrillers, but in recent years has also become a kind of anthology Master of Ceremonies, rounding up choice selections in such genres as pulp and vampire fiction. Most recently, he has curated two volumes in Houghton Mifflin’s “Best American” series—“The Best American Mystery Stories 2010” (with Lee Child) and “The Best American Noir of the Century” (with James Ellroy).

When did the undead become so popular? Vampires used to lurk on the fringes of pop culture: but these days they are heroes, heartthrobs, and the family next door.

This year’s New Yorker Festival featured a panel on gay marriage--an appropriate topic given this month's onslaught of gay hate crimes, suicides and statements from elected officials about gay rights. The longstanding fight over same-sex marriage between gay rights activists and conservative politicians is now more heated than ever. The New Yorker Festival’s panel on gay marriage was a timely discussion that laid out current arguments from both sides.

In the latest episode of KGB's non-fiction reading series, Moustafa Bayoumi read from his book, "How Does it Feel to be a Problem?: Being Young and Arab in America."

If anything could create a heated debate at 10 AM on a Saturday morning it would be politics. And of all the politics around, the Tea Party is almost guaranteed to fan the fire.

Readings from a memory champion and about a champion of recorded memories.

On Sunday, a line of rain-sopped literary types wrapped around the block to hear British-Indian novelist Salman Rushdie speak to Indian poet and novelist Tishani Doshi at Brooklyn's St. Francis College auditorium. After an hour wait, the crowd finally shuffled in to shake out their umbrellas and hear the writers talk. The event, which was part of the 2010 Brooklyn Book Festival, started off with remarks from Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. His introduction got a round of applause in the name of Brooklyn pride.

The Happy Ending Reading and Music Series ended its season on a fantastical note, in a program promising “Metaphors and Epiphanies.”

45 years after Martin Luther King Jr. led 25,000 marchers to the state capitol in Montgomery Alabama to protest denial of voting right to African Americans, the Bronx Museum is paying tribute to this historic event with photographic exhibit “Road to Freedom: The Civil Rights Movement 1958-1968 and Beyond." Earlier this spring, several artists and photographers came together at The New School to discuss the works and their context.

Even in wartime, you have to eat, and two writers tell us how they lived and dined in the Middle East at a reading at KGB.

If you only know one thing about Neil deGrasse Tyson (The Director of the Hayden Planetarium at The American Museum of Natural History ) it is probably that he was the man who outraged a lot of people when he demoted Pluto—it’s not a planet anymore.

If you know what 33 1/3 means, you're either over sixty, an audiophile, or a DJ.

In many countries that have been wracked by ethnic cleansing or a civil war, the victims of torture, and the people who tortured them, still live too close for comfort.

PEN often advocates for writers wrongfully imprisoned for politically reasons, but also chose to devote a panel at its recent World Voices Festival to writers from the more traditional prison community.

It’s hard to image anyone could get in serious trouble for appearing on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, but it happened last year to the journalist Maziar Bahari.

The Poetry Project held a reading on a recent humid Wednesday evening at St. Mark's Church in the East Village featuring the contemporary poets Matvei Yankelevich and Robert Fitterman. Both poets are somewhat topical in their subject matter. Yankelevich balances idealism with irony in the treatment of his hip themes, while Fitterman favors humor with a hint of self-deprecation. The room was packed. Use the player above to listen to the entire event.

Writers Sharifa Rhodes-Pitt and Alice Albinia both write about their journeys and, appropriately enough, met in India while travelling. A mutual acquaintance suggested that Sharifa contact Alice and one day, despite not being in the habit of contacting strangers, she called Alice. They’ve been friends ever since, and joined together to read from their respective works at True Story: The KGB Bar's Nonfiction Reading Series.

David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker magazine, engaged in a candid and casual conversation about his new book, "The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama," at Barnes & Noble, Union Square on April 28. After a brief history of why he chose to write a book on Obama, a figure who has been extensively covered, Remnick answered questions from the audience.

Remember that old adage about not judging a book by its cover? Turns out it’s true.

If you lived in a country in constant conflict, how would that affect you? The people who live in Kashmir have been shadowed by chaos and uncertainty since 1989. Justine Hardy wrote about the region in her new book, In the Valley of the Mist.

We know birds sing in courtship, but Ofer Tchernichovski, a professor of Biology at CUNY, has been researching the way in which songbirds learn their “language” of song, while drawing some comparisons to human culture along the way.

The Rubin Museum of Art’s Brainwave series pairs neuroscientists with artists and visionaries from multiple disciplines for lively discussions about how our minds work and how we perceive the world.

What does the term, "Asian-American," mean? The Asia Society invited a diverse group of panelists who reflect the changing face of Asian-Americans in America to tackle the topic. The panel included the jazz pianist Vijay Iyer, and New York City Controller John C. Liu.

Jane Jacobs and Robert Moses are routinely pitted against each other--or at least their philosophies are--in conversations regarding street life and car and highway culture in New York City. Earlier this spring, the Museum of the City of New York hosted a panel discussion on the two big thinkers called "Robert Moses, Jane Jacobs and the Automobile." The auditorium was packed, and the conversation lively, as discussions on these contentious subjects often are.

Like rich people, cartoonists are different from you and me. They see the world as a series of absurd scenes awaiting captions.

Sex and crime—genre fiction mainstays—come together with "literary" writing in a new anthology edited by bestselling crime writer SJ Rozan and Jonathan Santlofer.

Five top war correspondents and writers talked about what motivates their work, as well as the role of the journalist in modern conflict, as part of a PEN World Voices Festival panel held at Le Poisson Rouge.

Christopher Hitchens delivered the Pen World Voices Festival closing Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture at Cooper Union.

Novelists from Afghanistan, Israel, Romania, and Spain discussed the way war has shaped their lives and their work, as part of the sixth annual PEN World Voices Festival. The event was held in cooperation with Scandinavia House.

Arthur Schwartz, food maven and cookbook author, has always had strong opinions about Jewish food — including everything from where to get the best pastrami in New York to the phrase “matzo ball soup.” His opinions are usually as salty as a kosher pickle, which is why The Museum of Jewish Heritage invited Schwartz to discuss David Sax’s first book, Save the Deli: In Search of Perfect Pastrami, Crusty Rye, and the Heart of Jewish Delicatessen. Schwartz wasted no time in playing the devil’s advocate. “Why should we save the deli?” he asked Sax. And with that, the two men launched into a lively discussion about the quintessential New York institution. Schwartz and Sax were introduced by the Museum’s Director of Public Programs, Elissa Schein.

Salman Rushdie and Patti Smith were just two of the many literary stars who kicked off the 2010 Pen World Voices Festival at The 92nd Street Y’s Unterberg Poetry Center. The festival showcased writers from around the globe, including those whose voices are often silenced by censorship in their own countries. On opening night, writers from China, Afghanistan and Estonia read their own works — in their native language and in translation. Bernard Schwartz, Director of the Unterberg Poetry Center and Steven L. Isenberg, the Executive Director of PEN America introduced the festival and the evening’s program.

Turns out, Jonathan Lethem has been a fan of Patti Smith's music since he was hanging out at CBGB as a tween. In their talk from this year's PEN World Voices Festival, the two writers discussed their love of books, punk music, and New York City in its grittier days. The East Village these days is a far cry from being edgy, neither author seemed to have lost the punk-fueled passion they had when they were teenagers.

Ian Buruma, author of Taming the Gods: Religion and Democracy on Three Continents, sat with Columbia University professor Andrew Delbanco during the Pen World Voices Festival. The two intellectuals met head-to-head at powerHouse Arena in Dumbo, Brooklyn and hashed out some of the most important and highly controversial topics in modern discourse both in America and Europe: religion, freedom, immigration and democracy. Stream and download the entire conversation here.

The Cornelia Street Café celebrates William Shakespeare’s birth each year by bringing to the stage actors to read a selection of the bard's sonnets. Robin Hirsch was the master of ceremonies, Paul Hecht directed, and the readers included André De Shields, Barbara Feldon, Kate Forbes and Hecht, himself. In the spirit of Elizabethan times, Hank Heijink played the lute. The performers covered favorites, such as sonnet number 18 (“shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”), as well as some lesser-known lines.

The StoryCorps project invites people from all over the country to share and preserve stories from their lives. The organization, based in Brooklyn, has recorded more than 30,000 personal tales in the past six years. Many of the stories are about moms and motherhood. Recently, StoryCorps founder and award-winning public radio producer David Isay presented some of these stories at the Tenement Museum on the Lower East Side. The event marked the release of the new book, Mom: A Celebration of Mothers from StoryCorps. Stream and download the talk here for free.

PEN's World Voices Festival brought Russian poet Inga Kuznetsova, Israeli writer Eshkol Nevo, Polish writer Andrzej Stasiuk and New York's own Jonathan Lethem together for a conversation about utopia and dystopia. The event was moderated by Albert Mobilio.

The packed house at BAM's Harvey Theater was probably eager to have a look at the protean actor whose dulcet malevolence has brought many nasty characters to life, including Professor Snape in the Harry Potter films, the Sheriff of Nottingham in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and terrorist Hans Gruber in Die Hard. But Alan Rickman was just as wily and entertaining as the director of Strindberg’s “relentless” (his words) marriage a trois, in a conversation with the New York Public Library’s Paul Holdengraber.

The Diary of Anne Frank continues to impact everyone—from grade-school students to scholars and artists. Three writers and experts on Anne Frank discussed the young girl's influential work at the PEN World Voices Festival. Francine Prose, Ernie Colón and Sid Jacobson spoke about the diary, how to write about Frank, as well as Holocaust deniers and censorship. Prose is the author of Anne Frank: The Book, the Life, the Afterlife. Ernie Colón and Sid Jacobson recently finished a graphic novel of the Anne Frank story and are the creators of The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation. The panel was moderated by Judith Thurman of The New Yorker.

Authors Shirley Hazzard and Richard Ford had a tête-à-tête about writing, poetry and much more at the 92nd Street Y for the PEN World Voice Festival. The chemistry between the two writers made for a lively discussion, and the pair elicted much laughter from the audience. In particular, Ford interviewed Hazzard about The Transit of Venus and The Great Fire. Annabel Davis-Goff read from "Harold," Hazzard's first story, which written when she was 20 years old and published in The New Yorker.

This year's Clifton Fadiman Medal was presented to Jamaica Kincaid for her coming of age novel Annie John. The award, established by the Center for Fiction in 2000, recognizes a book worthy of "rediscovery and wider readership." Novelist Jane Smiley served as the 2010 judge and presenter of the award. Kincaid received the medal at a ceremony held at the Center for Fiction and the organization's director, Noreen Tomassi, spoke about the award and introduced the two novelists.

Quiet, please! While waiting for an event with George Prochnik, the crowd at the New York Public Library’s Celeste Bartos Forum was assailed by a barrage of sound—car horns, church bells, tape hiss—all examples of the noisy world the author says has overwhelmed us. Prochnik advocates a kind of sonic environmentalism, the creating and preserving silent places. He spoke about his new book, In Pursuit of Silence: Listening for Meaning in a World of Noise, with the NYPL’s Paul Holdengraber.

The Story Prize is an annual book award that recognizes outstanding short fiction. The authors are judged for their collections of short stories, and the winner of the prize receives $20,000. Two other finalists also receive $5,000 awards. This year’s Story Prize went to author Daniyal Mueenuddin. The Pakistani-American writer and the two other finalists read from their works at the awards ceremony held at The New School’s Tishman Auditorium.

The PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature brought writers from all over the world to New York City this week. In a fitting move, the annual event included New York Stories, a panel on how the Big Apple inspires the written word. On Thursday night, authors, urbanites and intellectuals crowded into the auditorium at the Morgan Museum to hear how New York City shaped the work of Henry James, Edith Wharton and Elizabeth Hardwick.

Peter Hessler, a former Beijing correspondent for The New Yorker, spent years in China before he decided to get a driver’s license. Then, license in hand, Hessler planned a road trip that followed the Great Wall. His new book, Country Driving: a Journey through China from Farm to Factory, is a memoir about his extended trip.

The PEN World Voices Festival kicked off with a panel about women and fiction in translation that addressed big, messy topics... that are impossible to put to rest.

Short story writer and novelist Nathan Englander dissected his writing and research methodology.

The two-time Booker Prize-winning Australian author Peter Carey discussed writing with an American perspective.