P.E.N. CONGRESS DISCUSSES OBSTACLES FACING WRITER IN MECHANIZED WORLD

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01315R000400200006-3
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 12, 2004
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: June 16, 1966
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved, For Release'!2'0050I/'17~CIA-RDP88-01315R000400200006-3
P. E.N. Congress Discusses Obstacles-
' Facing Writer in Mechanized ,World.'
By IlARRY 4imoy
\Vriters at the International
,P.E.N, Congress in New York
yesterday devoted thousands of
words to modern forces Inimical
to their craft. This stirred a
publisher who, is 'participating
to admonish them:
"One necessity for a writer
Is to be Lough-minded."
The publisher was William
Jovanovich, president of Har-
court Brace and World. He is a
member of
P.E.N.-an organ-
ization of poets, playwrights,
essayists and novelists-because
,he is an author In his own right.
His admonition was well re-
col ved. Most of the 650 writers
attending the congress evident-
ly feel, judging from their
con-versation, that an author must
resist outside pressures and do
his work the way he knows Is best.
Writer's Troubles Are Topic
saying that because of the ech~lhe now Considered this to,be '"a:.
Loeb Student Center of Newt
J York University, the emphasis
was on things that interfere
with the writer's iindependence.
Robert Goffin of France, who
adroitly conducted one panel
talk in both French and Eng.
lish, defined Its subject as "the
confrontation of the writer with
the difficulties he comes
across."
Elmer Rice, the Americap
playright, indicated that the
most important difficulties were
not new, since he had written
an essay 14 years ago on the
Industrialization of the writer
by films, radio and television.
He read from his article, at
length. Finally an English
writer stood up in the audience
and asked Mr. Gofffin to call a
halt.
Bogdan -Pogacnik of Yugo-
slavia took up the theme by
However, In two panel dis-
eussions that went on sinnil-
taneously in. two ]rills of the
writers Were relatively unknown
in centersi of culture' in..,thel
United States and, Europe. ,
Approved For Release 2005/01/12 CIA-RDP83=01315R000400200006-3
nology of mass production the misreading of the effects of Mr. Ellison added: "The re-
writer was usually reduced to mechanization," porter was just getting thel
doing daily salaried work. He Rosamond Lehmann, the; feedback from the sociological
urged that the writer should English novelist, said-"the trou-I;jargon that is going around."~'
continue to be Independent " in, ble with writers Is their self-II Leon, Edel, professor of Eng? 1
his morality," consciousness." This spreads
.Philip A. Hope-Wallace oftlie Idea; she said, that all writ-
public rather than because of den 'Pond and finding on the!'
some imaginative compulsion shore several trailers with tele-
that really gives pleasure tolvision masts, and of going t.o;
England spoke of "a well
known magazine that employs
hundreds of good writers," but
boils down their work with'the
result "usually of falsifying the
individual contributions."
New Media Found AVantinx
Paola Milano of Italy sug-
gested there. was something in
the nature of the 'new com-
munications medi,, that inter-
be impossible to translate."The~of LSlS= fail u e s uE eyng'booics al?e a cry i t d.^..,n?iri
Divine Comedy" Into Bantu be- HMEncrated, he said"" That' reminded her of the .sick
cause of the scantiness of that Ile quote a public official asiman who went to a doctor. He,
language's vocabulary, he said,isaying "Lp-t's loin the revolu-iwas suffering from melancholy,i
"and similarly certain media,
make It impossible to translate ',.riQ1' JicJce ," He added: "Youland the physician said that they
a masterpiece Into them." '',can't think. about the problemsfeure was for him to go to the'
from Kenya, retorted to that anguage." "That is no good," he replied
argument by saying that Bantu . At a panel presided over by, "because I am the clown."
had a large vocabulary, He add- Louis Martin -Chauffier of h She added: "Yet writers are
ed that 'we in Africa do not France, writers explored the ;Healthy, as Is proved by their'
think that art is sacred, so if ways literature and the social-ability to travel the great dis-
there is any medium to reach1sciences deal with the nature'tance to be here."
our people, many of whom can-.of contemporary. man. Thee . Latin American writers asked
not read, we will use it," chairman made a plea for lit-:fat, the holding of 'a special
` Jean Bloch-Michel of Franceerary people to keep up theisymposium during the after
expressed doubt that the mass standards of style in writing. noon, which was supposed to be
media hurt the writer's lode-- Ralph. Ellison, the American"a holiday for the congress.
pendence of mind. Mr. Jovano-novelist, told of watching on~'Phey explained that this was
vich, took up that thought witl television a reporter interview-lithe first chance many of them
the observation that many writ~4ng a young boy who was in-ever had to meet.
ers were subject to "a kind o volved in a riot In Jersey Clty, I . Manuel G. Balbontin of Chile
sentimentality about thei The boy wars asked why he took expressed the dominant view of
role." ?; art in the riot -A he meetin
p
whe
h
g,
n
e com-.
He said there were mor "Why?" he said. "Becausejptafned that Latin American
readers today than ever before I'nt'culturally deprived and I'm
and that more good awritermfrom a, broken fathily that. Is
were B living atrlarchatly dominated
ink than In the pas He said ,,;-,~~;d(
he would have agreed with Mr,
Rice about the unfortunate' ef
fects of the industrialization of
lish at New York University,,!
spoke of "the torrent of received
ccItitor of tr, ri{t h-3uagaz Italians strolling with -transls-'?
'nemmt . , said that one influ- for radios tuned to rock 'n' roll.
words" spreading through aill Leda Mileva of Bulgaria oh?i