The University of Hawaii Press recently published the largest and most comprehensive collection of Cambodian literature available in English to date. Published in September 2022, From the Shadow of Angkor: Cambodian Poetry, Prose and Performance through the Agesis featured in the biannual publication Mānoa: A Pacific Journal of International Writing.

Assembled over 30 years, the book features:

• 14 centuries of literature, from ancient transcriptions to a graphic novel excerpt (all colors).
• Literature rescued almost lost during the civil war in Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge regime and its aftermath.
• Literature never before available in English, including translations of Khmer, Sanskrit and French works, as well as pieces written in English by writers from the Cambodian diaspora.

“[T]his book seeks to bring Cambodian literature out of the shadows of the great temples of Angkor and the ashes of a war that killed most of the country’s authors and destroyed countless irreplaceable books, whether by fire, neglect or turning into cigarette paper or toilet paper,” wrote Sharon May, one of the anthology’s five guest editors.

The book includes passages from reamer, an adaptation of the Hindu Ramayana, and works from the Cambodian Golden Age, including Khun Srun on political repression. Emerging writers, poets, musicians and performers are also featured, pushing the boundaries with diverse reflections on contemporary Cambodia and the diaspora.

Members of uh The community can view the works for free through Project Muse.

Step out of the shadow of Angkor is the companion volume of In the shadow of Angkor (spring 2004). Both appear as part of the Manoa series.

More on the Manoa editors

The penultimate issue of the journal was produced by the distinguished and long-serving editorial team Frank Stewart and Pat Matsuedafrom uh Mānoa Department of English before their retirement in the fall of 2022.

Stewart is a writer, translator and founding editor of Mānoa: A Pacific Journal of International Writing. He is Emeritus Professor of English at uh Manoa.

Matsueda served as editor of Manoa since 1992.

Named “Godmother of Plant Life” by The New York Times last year, bestselling author Frances Moore Lappé is a household name to many because she ushered in the modern vegetarian era with the 1971 publication of “ Diet for a Small Planet”. rapidly throwing soy beans and veggie burgers into American kitchens and inserting the excessive land and water use of animal-based foods into the national conversation.

Since its publication 51 years ago, the landmark book has sold more than 3 million copies and has been reprinted and reissued many times, including a 50th anniversary edition last year. Next weekend, Lappé is giving the Saturday keynote address at the Common Ground Country Fair in Unity.

When I contacted Lappé (who goes by the name Frankie) at her home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, by phone, she told me she was looking forward to speaking at the Vegetarian Fair, hosted by the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners. Association, which founded the same year, “Diet for a Small Planet” was published. This year’s fair marks Common Ground’s return after being dark for two years due to the pandemic.

Best-selling author Frances Moore Lappé will deliver the keynote address Saturday at the Common Ground Country Fair in Unity. Photo by Michael Piazza

“It brings back so many memories of the whole trip,” said Lappé, who was just 26 when his book was published. “The 1970s were the era of questions, and so many questions about our relationship to the Earth and to consumption. It was the perfect time to become an adult. People felt empowered to change their lives. They questioned each other positively.

In the foreword to the original edition, Lappé began by telling readers, “This book is about PROTEIN – how we as a nation are caught in a pattern that wastes it” and that “our culture strongly centered on meat is at the very heart of our waste of the land’s productivity.The book provides detailed information – with considerable updates for the 50th anniversary edition – on the problems created by animal agriculture as well as the proposed solution to eating plant-based protein. It concludes with over 120 practical pages of vegetarian and vegan recipes and menu ideas, updated for the most recent edition with submissions from food heavyweights, including Bryant Terry, Alice Waters and Mark Bittman.

“Diet for a Small Planet” was a major part of the 1970s zeitgeist, and it started a wave of vegetarian events, including the 1972 publication of “The Vegetarian Epicure” by Anna Thomas and “The George Bernard Shaw Vegetarian Cookbook” by the playwright’s housekeeper, Alice Laden. In 1973, Lappé’s publisher published “Recipes for a Small Planet” by Ellen Buchman Ewald, which introduced Lappé to vegetarian cooking and helped create the recipes for Lappé’s book.

I was born in 1973, and while growing up in Litchfield, Maine, a copy of Lappé’s book was ubiquitous in my non-vegetarian childhood kitchen. The same year I was born, the iconic Moosewood Restaurant opened in Ithaca, New York, and the following year it self-published the now classic “Moosewood Cookbook.”

At first, the Moosewood Restaurant served fish alongside vegetarian and vegan dishes, but later switched to an all-vegetarian and heavily vegan menu. Today the restaurant continues under the new ownership of Danica Wilcox, daughter of one of the co-founders.

In Maine, the influential Hollow Reed opened in Portland’s Old Port in 1974, and the following year, Town Farm Restaurant opened in Bar Harbor. Both relatively short-lived establishments were widely considered vegetarian restaurants. However, each served aquatic animals, meaning the restaurants were pescatarian but not actually vegetarian (although the Town Farm Restaurant published an all-vegetarian cookbook in 1979). In 1975, a major vegetarian event was the first-ever United States World Vegetarian Congress, held at the University of Maine at Orono.

All of these efforts were bolstered by the popularity of “Diet for a Small Planet”. Even so, few expected that what began as a one-page document distributed by Lappé in the late 1960s would enjoy instant success and lasting cultural impact.

“I thought maybe my book would appeal to a few hundred people in the Greater Bay Area (of San Francisco) when I wrote it,” Lappé said. “It was a big shock when he started selling and selling.”

In “Diet for a Small Planet”, Lappé shows how food is wasted by turning mountains of grain into much smaller amounts of animal flesh. Each edition has advocated for people to eat plant-centered meals, both as a way to protect the environment and feed the hungry. Soon, Lappé would add better democracy, increased social justice, and a fairer community economy to the benefits of a plant-based food system.

“Democracy is the root of all solutions,” Lappé told me. “We the people don’t make these decisions because there’s so much big corporate agribusiness corruption in food policy.”

Realizing how much the American food system has been shaped by the influence of money in politics, Lappé worked to improve American democracy in the years after the book’s initial publication. She co-founded the Center for Living Democracy and has published numerous books on the subject, including the most recent “Daring Democracy” with Adam Eichen.

During our conversation, Lappé spoke about the erosion of political rights and civil liberties in the United States over the past decade. She pointed to the annual Freedom in the World Index, which measured the United States’ shift from ranking alongside top democracies in 2010 to ranking alongside emerging democracies by 2020. Freedom House, which maintains the index , argues that American democracy is under threat and has suffered because of inequalities created by racism, money in politics, and extremism fueled by partisan polarization.

Lappe’s message of freedom, democracy and simple plant-based living is sure to resonate at the Common Ground Fair. As I wrote last year, MOFGA has been known for its vegetarian-friendly vibe since the organization’s founding in 1971. Fair trade vendors serve many vegan and vegetarian dishes.

“Diet for a Small Planet” was instrumental in cultivating this plant culture at MOFGA, according to Abbie McMillen, one of MOFGA’s early organizers and first editor of its journal, and Roberta Bailey, who wrote the Harvest Kitchen recipe column in MOFGA. diary since 1984. Both told me last year that Lappé’s book shaped their thinking about food.

Lappé, herself a vegetarian who is trying to switch to oat milk in her morning coffee, acknowledges the long list of problems facing humanity. Still, she remains hopeful. She told me she was not optimistic, but “possibilistic”.

“The theme song of my life,” Lappé said, “is that the more choices we make that align us with the world we want for ourselves and others, the more that world is built. Food is a link with everything.

Frankie’s Feijoada

6 servings

This recipe was a favorite from the first edition, with updates from a Brazilian friend for the 20th anniversary edition. – Excerpt from “Diet for a Small Planet”

1/4 cup oil
1 large onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 green onions (white and light green parts), chopped
1 green bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1 tomato, chopped
3 cups cooked black beans, or two 15-ounce cans, rinsed and drained
2 cups of vegetable broth
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon of white wine vinegar
2 celery stalks, chopped
1/2 sweet potato, diced (optional)
1 ½ teaspoons of salt
Chopped fresh cilantro and 1 sliced ​​orange, for garnish

Heat the oil in a large saucepan and sauté the onion, garlic, green onions, green pepper and tomato until the onion is translucent. Add beans, broth, bay leaf, vinegar, celery, sweet potato and salt. Bring the mixture to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes.

Mash some beans in the pan to thicken the mixture and continue cooking for another 5 minutes. Remove the bay leaf and garnish the stew with chopped cilantro and orange slices. To be enjoyed with rice and green vegetables.

Avery Yale Kamila is a food writer who lives in Portland. She can be reached at: [email protected]
Social: AveryYaleKamila

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Every serious writer needs a website. It is the primary vehicle readers use to connect with an author. When my first short story was published in 2015, Jennifer Preyss-Mathlouthi covered the story for The Advocate and then helped me create my first website. I don’t know how I would have started without his generous help.

I was writing devotionals regularly and learning to post them as blogs, then switching to a monthly newsletter, but that was the extent of the interaction with my website. Several years passed as I tackled longer writing projects. I plunged into the learning curve of writing fiction and quit writing devotionals. My monthly newsletters also came to a halt as I continued to struggle with story arcs, characters, and the review process.

With the onset of the pandemic, websites were no longer optional – they became an essential tool for marketing. However, at that time my website was dated. Technology had also gained ground and the challenge of an upgrade was daunting. I had overcome a few technical issues, but creating a new website was like rocket science.

A writing guru likes to say that anyone can create a website. I guess that’s true on some level. Unfortunately, while I could watch enough YouTube videos to understand the many different elements, time was ticking faster than my ability to get there.

At an impasse, I prayed about it and sought help from a virtual assistant. Then I got a recommendation for a new company that specializes in helping authors get through the finish line with all the technology requirements.

I hired the new four-woman team, better known as The Author’s Write Hand. They were happy to fix any technical issues that were giving me headaches. The tasks they accomplished were: 1) Resuscitate my newsletter and connect it to a mail server. 2) Added the free eBook to my website. 3) Outsourcing website modifications and security issues. 4) Provide ongoing assistance with social media posts to attract interested readers to my website. These things had to be in place and working well before I marketed my first book.

Although challenging for all, we worked hard to meet an urgent deadline.

Before we know it, Labor Day weekend has entered our lives. I wasn’t sure until the day before if I would be hosting our family reunion in New Braunfels, but my contact person and I came up with a plan so we could both enjoy the vacation.

It was a wonderful break. Our family indulged in cheeseburgers and tried different snack type desserts. The young cousins, aged 3 to 9, were delighted to see each other again and played together nonstop. I drank hot tea with my daughter and daughter-in-law and caught up on the latest news.

The men indulged in games of chess and the dogs wrestled.

Later, the adults tried to touch their toes while the children took turns doing handstands and cartwheels in the middle of the living room floor.

Our time together was relaxing and peaceful. My email faithfully waited until late in the evening.

Two nerve-wracking days later, my website was finished and my first newsletter was launched after a two-year hiatus. If you want to hear more book news, check out my website at marypatjohns.com. Sign up for my newsletter and receive a free eBook. This is a short story about our son’s deployment to Afghanistan and was first published by Chicken Soup for the Soul. It eventually became the inspiration behind the series of books I write.

My hands and feet waver when it comes to the book publishing process, but “Behold, God is my helper: He is the support of my soul”, Psalms 54:4, NAS/

Iranian military leaders have unveiled a new line of attack drones which they say have been built with “unique capabilities that have been considered specifically to target Haifa and Tel Aviv”, two of Israel’s largest cities.

The drone, dubbed Arash 2, has been on display as part of wartime exercises organized by the Iranian army over the past week, according to a report in Iran’s state-controlled media on Monday. Brigadier General Kioumars Heidari, commander of Iran’s ground forces, said unmanned attack drones were vital to Tehran’s war machine.

Iran’s new armaments have been on public display as its leaders plan to enter a revamped version of the 2015 nuclear deal, which will unlock millions in assets that Iran is expected to use to bolster its regional terror operations and its missile networks. Israel is strongly opposed to the deal, saying it will increase the likelihood of a major attack on the Jewish state. Iran’s public disclosure of these drones is likely intended to deter a possible Israeli strike on its disputed nuclear sites.

Heidari told Iranian television that drones like the Arash 2 are a key pillar of the country’s offensive capabilities.

“Today we have drones with a strategic range and also a drone with a range of 2,000 kilometers,” Hedari said, indicating that the drones are more than capable of reaching Tel Aviv from Tehran. “Of course we also have drones with lower ranges in our inventory.”

The Arash 2 drone, the military chief added, “has been specifically designed to attack Haifa and Tel Aviv” and is ready “to start operating” on this mission. Further details of the drone will be revealed during upcoming military exercises, according to the report.

“Arash 2 has both seekers and is also equipped with seekers in addition to other unique abilities that it fetches itself multiple times until it hits the target, precisely,” the report states.

In 1988, 25-year-old John Mitchinson, then a London bookseller, was the first person to interview Salman Rushdie about his new book The Satanic Verses.

OWhile writing The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie had this note pinned to his wall: “To write a book is to make a Faustian contract in reverse. To gain immortality, or at least posterity, you lose, or at least ruin, your current daily life. The degree of ruin that was to follow was hardly foreseeable, and as the waves of revulsion and outrage ripple through its latest manifestation – the grotesque attack at the Chautauqua Institution on August 12 – I remember arriving on his doorstep in Islington in July 1988.

I was a 25-year-old bookseller who had found himself working for the publishing department of Waterstone’s, the new and growing British bookstore chain. We had decided to add author interviews to enhance our seasonal catalog and the first of seven I had been co-opted to write was with Salman Rushdie for The Satanic Verses, due out in September. I arrived with my tape recorder and a proof of the novel. I was, he says, the first person to officially tell him about the new book, and he proved to be a warm and enthusiastic conversationalist. He was strangely impressed that I had not only read it, but also read Midnight’s Children and Shame. I pointed out that this was my very first interview – I like to think my rookie enthusiasm put him at ease.

Re-reading the interview some 34 years later, I’m struck by how far we’ve come and how much he has gone to great lengths to present the novel as an attempt to understand rather than condemn religious belief. “To reject it would be a very condescending thing to do to an entire culture, indeed, it denies their worldview equal status to yours.”

We now know it is precisely this worldview that would be condemned and reviled, handing it a death sentence followed by a decade of exile and isolation and a threat that apparently will never fully recede. . “I suspect there will be problems,” he told me that sunny morning, when I asked him what his expectations were for the book’s reception in India. Trouble came sooner and closer to home than he, or anyone else, expected.

Booksellers have mostly found themselves on the right side of the line in the ensuing “how best to respond” dilemma. At Waterstone we have not faced the terrifying immediacy of death threats with which editors and translators have been bombarded, but Collet’s and Dillons in London and Abbey’s in Sydney have all been burned down. WH Smith refused to store the book after the book burning protest in Bradford in January 1989. Waterstone officials were given the choice. Most sold it openly; some hid it but were happy to sell it if asked. By the time my interview was reprinted in The Bookseller in April 1989, the book was firmly anchored at the top of UK bestseller lists.

In 1990 we smuggled Salman to Waterstone’s in Hampstead with his son Zafar, to sign copies of Haroun and the Sea of ​​Stories. More live events followed. In 1992 it appeared (unannounced) at the Hay Festival and in 1995 the Hampstead branch held a live reading of The Moor’s Last Sigh, a sold-out sale even though tickets were only advertised in the morning reading. Gradually, the situation improved, and Salman began to appear regularly at literary evenings, festivals and conferences. Until last month, it looked like he had been fully rehabilitated into the world of books rather than politics, protest and police protection. I was touched when, along with many other booksellers, I was invited and publicly thanked at the launch of his memoir, Joseph Anton in 2012.

LLooking back on those early years, what strikes me most is how simple it seemed to defend a writer’s right to self-expression. There was no Twitter piling to negotiate, less room for public shame and blame, and far less anxiety about offending. When Salman won author of the year at the British Book Awards in 1995, I remember the whole room cheering.

He mentions it in Joseph Anton: “I must not forget that there is an England which is on my side. There was and still is. But discussions of free speech have found themselves belittled by endless social media outrage and blatant attempts to align a writer’s basic human right not to be killed or violently with the so-called ” cancellation culture. The Satanic Verses was a novel, not a thoughtless tweet.

I reread the book recently and I was amazed at everything I had forgotten: what a good and subtle, funny and generous novel. In the interview, Salman talked about the book trying to establish an “ethics of impurity.” He added: “Most of our problems start when people try to define the world in terms of stark opposition between good and evil, or in terms of racial and national purity.” I suspect that’s what really stoked the fear of fundamentalists. Novels change us from within, blur boundaries, allow ideas to fertilize and new ones to develop and flourish.

But the subversive magic of fiction compels you to Lily this. Hadi Matar, the man accused of the Chautauqua attack, confessed that he only managed a few pages of The Satanic Verses. Over the years, many other people have complained about how difficult, even illegible, Rushdie’s fiction is. (Reader, it really isn’t.) That’s why we booksellers can feel a certain pride. We held on and made Satanic Verses something people could and still can read.

But the last word goes to Salman: “The way art changes society is never on a large scale – you write a book and governments fall – it never happens. What matters is how a book affects the people who actually read it and connect with it. That’s when he can make an irreversible change in the way you see things – you’re not the same person you were before. There has been a small shift in your perception of the world that stays and never recedes. That’s why I write fiction.

Salman Rushdie was attacked on August 12, 2022 as he prepared to give a public lecture at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, New York. satanic verses are available from Unity Books Auckland and Wellington.

Sade Bamimore (her), Senior Associate (Consultant II) within the Corporate Sustainability & Climate Change team at ERM, recently published her book, Reinventing systems for a sustainable future. Here she explains what inspired her to become an author, her interest in sustainability and how we can all be sustainability leaders.

My interest in sustainability developed at the age of 19 after taking an introductory environmental science course in college. Through class projects that allowed me to learn more about my carbon footprint, I began to understand how my actions have a systemic impact on the environment and on people around the world. After completing this environmental science course, my passion for sustainability grew even stronger during two semesters abroad in Copenhagen, Costa Rica and Peru. In particular, during my stay in Copenhagen, I first heard about the Chief Sustainability Officers. After learning about the impact they have on their organizations, I was immediately inspired to pursue this role as my dream job.

After graduating from college, I joined a book-writing program called The Creator Institute to start writing a book about sustainability directors and other sustainability leaders who pioneered the profession. of sustainable development. I started writing my book in June 2019 and as part of my research I interviewed over 60 sustainability leaders across all sectors to understand how they define their roles and see what their visions are for their roles. in the future.

Midway through my book-writing journey, I began my role as a Sustainability Strategy and Disclosure Consultant at ERM in September 2020. As a Sustainability Consultant, I was equipped with the tools to implement the sustainability at a tactical level to help drive sustainable systems in businesses. Working at ERM has given me the opportunity to work with sustainability leaders from the world’s largest companies, which has given me a better understanding of what their roles look like on a day-to-day basis.

Writing a book while working full time was one of my most difficult experiences. Working eight hours a day, then rotating to work on my book for several more hours at night – and sometimes until the early hours – every weekday, then continuing to work on my book on the weekends, was mentally and physically exhausting. Although the three years leading up to the publication of my book were extremely difficult, the reward of Reinventing systems for a sustainable future being released in January 2022 outweighs the hard times for me.

ERM has shown their support for my book in several ways. After my book was published by New Degree Press, ERM promoted my book throughout the company and offered to reimburse colleagues in my business unit who had purchased my book. Twice a year, ERM opens an application window for its Global Technical Paper and Publication Award, a company-wide award that recognizes thought leadership and expertise in alignment with ERM’s global strategy. After submitting an application, ERM selected me to receive a Global Technical Paper and Publication Award for promoting thought leadership in sustainability through the publication of my book.

Being a published author is both exciting and daunting. I have a real sense of relief and peace that something I have worked for for so long has been accomplished. Editing is also an extremely vulnerable experience, as I don’t know how the book is going to be perceived by those who read it. But the idea that anyone can access the knowledge shared in my book is incredibly rewarding to me. Achieving the goal of publishing my book and sharing knowledge about sustainability leadership was well worth the challenges.

I hope that by reading Reinventing systems for a sustainable future, readers will gain a deeper awareness of sustainability leadership and discover how their own ecological selves can propel them toward action, servant leadership, and justice. I want people to see this book as an opportunity to engage in systems thinking, escape the bystander effect, seek equity and justice, and learn alongside sustainability leaders l importance of elevating sustainable development. My book includes various insights into what people can do to be full-fledged sustainability leaders, such as being engaging systems thinkers, change management specialists, and influencers without authority.

Sade Bamimore (her) is a Senior Associate (Consultant II) within ERM’s Corporate Sustainability & Climate Change team. Based in New York, Sade has worked with ERM since September 2020. In 2022, she was recognized as a GreenBiz Emerging Leader by GreenBiz Group.

“Don’t age,” my grandmother once advised me. I nodded in futile agreement, wondering what the alternative was, and how old was ‘old’ anyway?

Jacinta Parsons is not old Old. She’s somewhere in her early forties, peri-menopausal, a woman who’s stopped getting calls on the street. “I’m only in the early stages of what aging will mean to me,” she wrote.

More than a memoir on aging, it is very precisely and politically about aging as a woman. It’s about being objectified all your life and then all of a sudden becoming invisible and wondering where all this rage is coming from. Parsons recounts his internal struggle with the “creep” of midlife, how realizations of his changing form and place in society set in, and that the middle is “always the worst place”.

Parsons uses Odyssian descriptions of the elements – fire, wind and water – to describe the experience of being a woman. She seeks mythological archetypes such as ‘the witch’, ‘the mother’ and ‘the slut’ to demonstrate how women have been placed in boxes all their lives, subjected to ‘street harassment’ and told to conform to expectations. of the society.

The first chapters cover “the maiden”, becoming a mother and being a woman who “defies the power elite” and will be “destroyed like women before them”. She weaves memoirs with statistics and anecdotes to back up her thoughts.

The point is, Parsons uses “woman” imagery universally, but it seems the type of aging she describes is anything but universal. It’s a deeply Western version, shaped by culture more than anything else.

She briefly touches on this point, acknowledging that “the experience of aging can be largely cultural” and that “aging comes to us both as a fact of biology and as a construct of culture”. She even states, at the beginning, her limited perspective as a cisgender white woman.

But the picture she paints is of a deeply dysfunctional society in which women are victims of patriarchy, internalized misogyny and a hyper-sexualized culture, which may be true, but it’s hard to believe that it is a universal experience. Don’t women from other cultures age with more dignity, without all these internal struggles? I started to wonder if it was all this internal struggle that made us all so unhappy about getting old.

One of the last chapters is a meditation on death, and perhaps the strongest. It seems that the realities of aging are finally being realized in Parsons’ acceptance of his own ultimate conclusion. She watches an apple core succumb to rot and raves about its relationship with time. There is comfort, she writes, in knowing that you will return to earth to nurture another; that letting go requires “absolute courage”.

Read: Book Review: This Devastating Fever, Sophie Cunningham

While there are some lovely snippets of footage that are sure to find an audience with fans of Parsons’ previous work, A matter of age looks like a long blog post with no groundbreaking revelations.

Shortly after, I retrieved Lily Brett’s memoir, Old seems to be other peoplein which she recounts, among other things, being assisted in an Apple store by two zealous and caring employees who use the “tone of voice you would use if you were talking to a three-year-old child”.

I found this vignette, with its kernels of insight into what aging in modern Western society actually looks like, more truthful.

A matter of age: Women, aging and the eternal selfHyacinth Parsons
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 9780733342165
Format: Paperback
Pages: 304 pages
MSRP: $34.99
Release date: September 7, 2022

AM Homes knows controversy well. Her first novel, “Jack,” written when she was 19, has been among the American Library Association’s most banned and contested books since its publication in 1989. Her fourth novel, “Music for Torching,” stung a nerve at an explosive moment. It dealt with a school shooting and its publication date – April 20, 1999 – coincided with the Columbine massacre.

His latest novel, “The Unfolding”, has a similar claim to uncanny prescience. Homes began writing it over a decade ago, around the time of President Obama’s defeat of Senator John McCain. In the book, a character identified only as “the Big Guy” organizes a group of wealthy Republicans to form the “Forever Men”, a secret cabal that has pledged to use any means necessary to sustain themselves and their species in the world. power. They assume that the women in their life will fall right behind them. But the Big Guy’s wife and daughter aren’t that flexible. They make discoveries that propel them on wacky journeys of their own.

I recently sat down to discuss “The Unfolding,” which comes out this week. The novel combines slapstick political satire with tender observations about the relationship between parents and children. Aspects of the story are reminiscent of Homes’ own adoption memoir, “The Mistress’s Daughter”, which traces the unexpected appearance of his biological mother in his life and the discovery of his biological father. It’s her first novel since “May We Be Forgiven,” which won the 2013 Women’s Fiction Award.

Homes and I have been professional acquaintances for years. In the early 1990s mutual friends insisted that we meet. At the time, I was writing a cultural history of the Barbie doll, and Homes recently published “A Real Doll,” a disturbing short story that begins, “I’m dating my sister’s Barbie.” Our conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

“The course” felt authentic because its fictional characters interact with real people. For example, Malcolm Moos, who wrote President Eisenhower’s 1961 speech warning against the “military-industrial complex,” is a real person. And George Washington too. What surprised you when you were doing the research?

I was fascinated by this feeling of confidence that comes not only from knowing its history, but also from having a legacy of historical significance. As I was finishing the book, this strange piece of information came to me: my ancestors owned the land that is now Capitol Hill – as everything Earth.

Ancestors of your biological father?

Yes, Dr. Thomas Gerrard. I also learned that two of my ancestors – they were sisters – sequentially married George Washington’s great-grandfather. There’s something about literally writing your way to some kind of story that you know on some level, not really knowing what you’re doing.

Are you saying you knew about a genetics level?

I am. My biological father had said things – and his own behavior was a bit “Big Guy” in that sense of large-scale trust and a sense of ownership or privilege of a place. And I didn’t quite understand that. But when I discovered this information, it made a lot more sense.

Who was your biological father?

A banker in Washington, DC In the book, the common thread of the Big Guy and his daughter Meghan is an echo of my life but also completely different. Because obviously I didn’t grow up with my dad. And we had none of those conversations and never spent more than 36 minutes together.

Your fiction has tended to be ahead of the curve – to portray cultural upheavals before they happen. Is it prescience or is it the reading of culture?

This is by no means the first time I’ve written my way to something. When I was writing “Jack”, my teachers were saying, “It’s going to be very controversial”. And I remember asking myself: Why? Was it because at the time there were no books about children whose parents were gay? Was it prescience? I like to think as a writer that it’s reading culture.

I like the way you evoke the values ​​of an entire class with three terms that vanish: “nobility obliges, haberdashery and supper”.

I was thinking of a generation that, for me, is rapidly fading. When I look at what happened with Trump, you see so much rule breaking. A lot of those rules weren’t written down because no one thought we ever had to write them down. Because people were expected to behave accordingly – and they all had the same desire to preserve democracy. But then one of my editors in England said, “Well, I’m confused because they keep talking about wanting to ‘preserve democracy’ but they don’t seem to want to.”

And I’m like, well, now democracy means different things to different people. Your “democracy” and my “democracy” are not necessarily the same things.

Where do the Forever Men — and their plans for disruption — fit in? The book ends before Trump emerges.

I’ve always been very interested in America after WWII, the investment in the American dream and the loss of understanding of the dream. This fits with the rise of big money and black money in politics. I imagine these men looking at Trump and asking, “Did we do that?” In other words, would it be attributable to them?

What did you hope to accomplish with this novel?

It’s important to me that this book be a weave of the ideas that are considered the great American novel – that is, a novel written by someone named Jonathan (that’s what the Jonathans do) – and the domestic intimate, which is also the feminine novel. It was a chance to weave them together and capture the big socio-political ideas and experiences with that of family. It also illustrates the differences between our public and private selves. The way the Big Guy is one person with his family and another version of himself when he’s with the Forever Men.

Despite its humor, the book paints a grim picture of America. Is there anything to be optimistic about?

Looking at the January 6 hearings, I look at all the women — the Young women – who intervened and provided information. Who put themselves in difficult positions. They were in these rooms and witnesses of things and the men did not take their presence into account.

Meghan is very specifically her own person. She comes to her senses and realizes that she may see the world differently from how it was described to her by her family. This process of individuation and separation is universal. I loved watching her discover her own sense of agency. If you don’t enter into yourself in a certain way, no one will push you there. The Big Guy may think she’s going to fall into her ideas. But it’s the Big Guy who is naive about his point of view.

Lord, author of “The Accidental Feminist,” is an associate professor at USC.

CNN
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Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly called for the prolonged imprisonment of his opponents who he says mishandled classified documents.

CNN’s KFile reviewed the former president’s comments, dating back to his first presidential campaign in 2016, from speeches, interviews and comments made on social media.

The former president is in potential legal danger after the Justice Department’s search of his Mar-a-Lago residence last month recovered more than 100 classified documents, with the DOJ alleging US government documents were ” likely concealed and removed” from a storage room at the Florida resort as part of an effort to “hinder” the FBI investigation. More than 320 classified documents have now been recovered from Mar-a-Lago, the Justice Department said, including more than 100 during the FBI search earlier this month.

Speaking in 2016 about the government’s decision not to indict Hillary Clinton with crimes related to their investigation into her handling of classified documents and use of a private email server while secretary of state, Trump , then a candidate, repeatedly promised that his administration would strictly enforce all rules regarding classified material.

“On political corruption, we will restore honor to our government,” Trump said in August 2016. “In my administration, I will enforce all laws regarding the protection of classified information. No one will be above the law. »

“One of the first things we need to do is apply all classification rules and enforce all laws relating to the handling of classified information,” he said in September 2016.

Speaking in July of that year, Trump said Clinton’s mismanagement “disqualifies” her from public office.

“Any government employee who engages in this kind of behavior would be prohibited from handling classified information,” Trump said. “Again, that alone disqualifies her.”

It wasn’t just Clinton whom Trump criticized, he also repeatedly called for the jailing of other opponents for what he said was mishandling of classified documents.

In 2017, when calls between Trump and foreign governments were leaked, as well as communications between new national security adviser Michael Flynn and foreign governments, Trump suggested those responsible for the leaks should go to jail.

“It’s the most confidential stuff,” Trump said. “Classified. It’s classified. You go to jail when you release stuff like that.

Trump has also repeatedly said that former FBI Director James Comey should be “prosecuted” in tweets pushing unfounded accusations that Comey leaked classified information. A DOJ Inspector General’s report found “no evidence that Comey or his attorneys disclosed the classified information contained in the memos to members of the media.” The IG’s office referred the findings of its report to the Justice Department for possible prosecution, and prosecutors declined to press charges.

“He leaked CLASSIFIED information, for which he should be prosecuted,” said a tweet from Trump in April 2018, with another saying Comey should be in jail.

Trump has also repeatedly and strongly called for the prosecution of his former national security adviser John Bolton. Following the release of Bolton’s memoir from his time in the Trump White House, “The Room Where It Happened,” Trump said the book contained classified information.

A federal judge involved in one of Bolton’s cases found he likely endangered national security with his book, but the judge also dismissed the Trump administration’s attempt to block publication of the book.

In 2020, Trump told Fox News that Bolton should go to jail for “many, many years” for publishing the memoirs.

“Confidential information; he should go to jail for this for many years,” Trump said.

In an interview with Greta Van Susteren, Trump again called for Bolton to be jailed.

“Here’s what he did: he released classified information, highly classified information, and confidential information, all different categories,” Trump said. “John Bolton should never have been allowed to do this. You know, the young sailor who sent a picture to his mother and other people. They go to jail for a long time. You can not do this. And it wasn’t as vital, as important as John Bolton.

Trump tweeted in June 2020 that Bolton had been “washed” until Trump hired him.

“I took it back and gave it a chance,” the tweet read. “[He] broke the law by disseminating classified information, in massive quantities. He must pay a very high price for it, as others have done before him. This should never happen again!!!”

Trump later said in an interview with Brian Kilmeade that regardless of whether Bolton had unknowingly leaked information in his book, “he should go to jail.”

A Justice Department investigation into Bolton was dropped in 2021, and he told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room” last year that his book “went through a review process. prior to publication” and that it “had been authorized by the team of experts who reviewed it, ardently.

For his part, the former president insisted that he declassify all documents seized during the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago, saying in a statement that he had a “standing order” saying “that the documents removed from the Oval Office and taken to Residence were deemed downgraded the moment he removed them.

The search warrant issued by the Justice Department identified possible violations of three laws, none of which depend solely on the classification of information.

In a filing Tuesday evening, the Justice Department alleged that government documents were also “likely concealed and removed” from a storage room at Mar-a-Lago as part of an effort to “hinder the FBI’s investigation into Trump’s potential mismanagement. classified materials.

In response, Trump acknowledged in a court filing on Wednesday that classified documents were found at Mar-a-Lago in January, but argued that shouldn’t have been alarming – and shouldn’t have led to the search of Trump’s Florida residence earlier this month.

The Department of Agriculture updated net farm income projections for 2022 on Thursday. Micheal Clements shares the details.

Clement: The USDA’s Economic Research Service released its September 2022 farm income forecast on Thursday. American Farm Bureau Federation economist Bernt Nelson says the USDA has revised farm income to be higher.

Nelson: Today’s report adjusted the net farm income forecast for 2022, up $7.3 billion, or 5.2% from 2021. This follows a $45.9 billion increase dollars in 2021 from 2020. ERS also adjusted the Feb. 4 net farm income projection for 2021, raising the forecast in the September report by $21.3 billion, or nearly 30%.

Clement: While benefiting from increased farm income, expenses are also higher.

Nelson: The February report showed a 17% increase from 2021 to 2022 in total agricultural spending. The September forecast increased total spending by $437.3 billion. The largest increases in spending came first from fertilizers, up 41%, and second from pesticides, up 25% from a year ago. In third place, we have fuel costs that have increased by 22% since 2021.

Clement: Nelson adds that there have been many changes in the world since the February report.

Nelson: I think the Russian invasion of Ukraine was really a wake-up call when we talk about a secure food supply. The disruption caused by the invasion caused crop prices to spike and then come back down. It’s the result of our farmers, they really got together and the production was good. That alleviated some of our supply concerns a bit.

Clement: Michael Clements, Washington.

Core University welcomes new Core Fellow, Professor Roger Alfani, Ph.D. Professor Alfani served as an adjunct faculty member of the School of Diplomacy and Core University for four years, but will join Core as a Fellow full-time and a faculty member for the fall 2022 semester. “Teaching at Seton Hall University for the academic core and the School of Diplomacy was not just about sharing knowledge or imparting information” , remarks Alfani, “It really means engaging with students who come from different disciplines and who are eager to learn and motivated to make a positive impact on this world. That’s the kind of passion I witness at Seton Hall. Passion for excellence, passion to lead and serve both locally and globally!”

Alfani comes to Seton Hall with a doctorate from the University of Montreal in religious studies and peacebuilding. He also holds a master’s degree from the same university in biblical studies and theology, where his studies focused on the Hebrew word “Ruah” (meaning “breath” or “spirit”) used in the Book of Judges. Subsequently, he continued his education and earned an Executive MS degree in International Affairs and Foreign Policy Analysis from Seton Hall’s School of Diplomacy.

Aflani’s book, Consolidation of Religious Peace in the Democratic Republic of Congo, is a study of the role of religious groups in peacebuilding in war-torn Congo. This publication led him to play a consulting role in an ongoing documentary production on the Congolese struggle for independence. Alfani also recently collaborated with Professor Jon Radwan of the Department of Communications on a paper “Communicating Transcendent Love: Interpersonal Encounter and Church-State Transitions in Fratelli Tutti,” which appears in a special issue on “Catholic Church–State Relations in Global Transition” in the journal religion.

A National Endowment for the Humanities Grant (NEH) recipient, Alfani is “so excited about the NEH Collaborative Fellowship that my colleague Nicole Eggers and I received. -confessional focuses on the role of religion in the lives of Congolese refugees through their experiences of flight and resettlement or repatriation. One of the main outcomes of this fascinating project will be to produce a co-authored monograph that will not only make a contribution to the fields of refugee studies and religious studies, but will also be a rich archive of refugee life stories. .” The hot topic of refugees through a religious lens will be a theme in a Foundation III course that Alfani is developing.

Known internationally as an expert on the history of Congolese politics, Alfani recently received two book offers from a leading academic press in the UK. With knowledge of reading and writing eight languages, including ancient Hebrew and Greek, Alfani also brings to his core courses an in-depth knowledge of diplomacy, culture and religion. The University Core is proud to welcome our dear colleague, Professor Roger Alfani, to his new role as Senior Fellow and we look forward to his future contributions to Seton Hall University.

The news that Salman Rushdie had been stabbed on stage at a literary festival in New York shocked the world. This sparked an outpouring of sympathy for the author, who has spent more than 30 years with a fatwa placed on his life. Amid concern for Rushdie’s health, some have begun to wonder if satanic verseshis 1988 novel accused of blasphemy against Islam, may even be published today.

It’s not an unreasonable question. Attitudes towards free speech, blasphemy and Islam have all changed significantly over the past three decades. Horrible crimes such as the murder of journalists from the French publication Charlie Hebdo in 2015 continued prompt support for freedom of the press. But it took exactly two days for some to suggest that #JeSuisCharlie solidarity would play “into the game of racists and fascists”. Rare is the defense of freedom of expression that comes without reservations: freedom of expression, but not for racists or Islamophobes; but not without consequences; but not the freedom to say things that I personally find offensive.

The result is that many who work in journalism, academia or publishing are now more concerned with avoiding offense than testing the limits of what can be said. In this context, advocating for freedom of expression often arouses mistrust. Defenders say they are aligned with racists, transphobes, deplorables. And nobody wants that. Rather than post and be damned, the message is to censor yourself in accordance with fashionable awakened values, or risk being cancelled. How did it happen?

In the 1980s, “woke” was black American street slang for being alert to specific racist threats as well as prejudice and injustice more broadly. “Woke” exploded into mainstream consciousness with the first incarnation of Black Lives Matter after the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014. In 2016, magazines were publishing lists of “young and woke” featuring featured “Celebs Who Lead by Example.” They profiled “15 Hot Celebs Who Get Even Hotter Once You Realize How Aroused They Are” and gave us “The Ultimate Guide to Arousing Celebrity Bros.”

As the revival grew in popularity, its definition narrowed. To challenge injustice in general means adopting a particular political position. To be awake today is to see the world through an identity lens. People are not viewed as individuals but as members of a group, with each group assigned a place in a hierarchy of privilege and oppression. Recognizing this “intersectionality” requires that, rather than being color blind, we focus on skin color and judge people accordingly. New orthodoxies are emerging: racism is systematically embedded in the psyche of white people; gender floats without biology. To challenge these orthodoxies is an act of heresy, a modern form of blasphemy. At the same time, those who now police have woken up are denying the label. Woke only exists in the imagination of old white men, they claim.

Yet, as I explore in my new book, How Woke won, despite the few activists, organized groups, or political parties that rally around the word “woke”, the values ​​associated with the term have come to dominate all aspects of society, from schools and universities to the police. , business, health care and justice. The creative industries – museums and art galleries, journalism and publishing – have proven to be particularly fertile ground for cultivating awakened values. This did not happen overnight, but over several decades. And this did not happen because of the merits of enlightened thought, but because institutions, devoid of any intrinsic sense of purpose, were unable or unwilling to uphold liberal values.

The fatwa against Rushdie was issued in 1989 by Ayatollah Khomeini, Iran’s Supreme Leader. In 2022, the ethos of the fatwa seems contemporary with Western attitudes. Wokethinking asserts that certain identity groups are more vulnerable than others due to oppression, even though it asserts that words are not only powerful, but equivalent to actual violence. To paraphrase a popular academic text, words can hurt. According to this way of thinking, not using the correct pronouns for a transgender person is not just a slip or statement of biological fact, but an invalidation of the person’s identity and a denial of their right to exist. The meeting of these two ideas – that people are vulnerable to offense and that words hurt – leads to censorship. Tragically, it can justify in the minds of a small number of deformed individuals acts of murderous violence.

Such beliefs impact every aspect of the publishing industry. The first task any author faces is securing a book deal. This is much more difficult to achieve if your views are heterodox but your identity is not. Stories abound of even established authors seeing new work turned down by mainstream publishers, or books rejected long after contracts have been signed. Those lucky enough to make it to the submission stage of a manuscript may find that they are expected to work with a sensitivity reader – in effect, a second editor, whose role is to point out stereotypes and report any word or phrase likely to offend so that they can be modified or deleted.

Even a proven ability to produce international bestsellers does not guarantee you a smooth journey through the publishing process. In November 2020, employees of Penguin Random House Canada complained that they had to work on Jordan Peterson’s site. 12 more rules for life. According to an article in Vice: “Another employee said that ‘people were crying in the meeting about how Jordan Peterson had affected their lives.’ They said a colleague explained how Peterson had radicalized their father and another explained how the publication of the book would negatively affect their non-binary friend. In June this year, Amazon workers staged a “die-in” protest to try to get the online retailer to stop selling what protesters called “anti-trans” books. They no doubt wanted Amazon to emulate Target, which pulled Abigail Shrier’s searing book, Irreversible damageoff its shelves following complaints from transgender activists.

Books are no longer safe from woke censorship, even when they have been in the public domain for a long time. In 2020, author and teacher Kate Clanchy won the prestigious Orwell Prize for her memoir Some Children I Taught and What They Taught Me. Just two years later, following reader reviews accusing Clanchy of employing racial stereotypes, her publisher dropped her and all distribution of her catalog of works ceased. Meanwhile, non-copyrighted classic texts are given trigger warnings to alert students to hidden dangers contained within their words.

When all of these censorship tactics fail and a “problematic” author slips through the net, activists plunge to new depths. Harry Potter Author JK Rowling has been bombarded with misogynistic abuse and death threats since speaking out for women’s rights. In 2021, Rowling said she had “gotten enough death threats to make up my house”. These threats must be taken seriously. Three activists have gone from targeting online to posting a picture of themselves outside her house, revealing to the world where Rowling’s family residence is. Scariest of all was the death threat Rowling received after expressing sympathy for Salman Rushdie on Twitter. “Don’t worry, you’re next,” replied a man who had previously tweeted his support for Hadi Matar, Rushdie’s alleged attacker.

Rather than offering her support for Rowling, best-selling novelist Joanne Harris, president of the UK’s Society of Authors, created a poll on Twitter. She asked her fellow authors if they had ever received a death threat, with potential responses being: “Yes”, “Hell, yes”, “No, never” and “Show me, damn it”. The lighthearted nature of the poll seemed to imply that Rowling was making a fuss over nothing. After a backlash, Harris deleted the poll, replacing it with one asking the same questions but in a slightly less upbeat tone.

Harris has since said the dispute between her and Rowling is “fabricated”, although the two women have been known to disagree on issues surrounding gender self-identification. But while Rowling, who believes gender is immutable, faces abuse on social media and her books pulled from stores, Harris, who believes trans women are actually women, continues to occupy the spotlight. one of the most influential positions in British publishing.

What should concern everyone is the message the publishing industry sends to young writers: Transgress current orthodoxies and you’re unlikely to ever see your work in print or on bookstore shelves. And if you somehow pull off this feat, no one will stand up for you when the inevitable abuse comes your way. A cowardly reluctance to defend freedom of expression now invades publishing, to the detriment of literature, creativity and reasoned argument.

As for satanic verses: the woke takeover of publishing indeed makes it highly unlikely that such a novel will be published today, at least by a major publishing house. Until the industry claims its allegiance to free speech rather than ideological orthodoxies, readers and writers will suffer.

Joanna Williams is the author of How Woke won:The elitist movement that threatens democracy, tolerance and reasonavailable in the US in September.

A decades-long battle over how best to provide the public with access to the fruits of US government-funded research has come to a head.

President Joe Biden’s administration announced yesterday that, by the end of 2025, federal agencies must make articles describing taxpayer-funded work freely available to the public upon publication of the final peer-reviewed manuscript. . The data underlying these publications must also be made available free of charge “without delay”.

Many details of the new policy, including exactly how the government will fund immediate public access, remain to be decided. But it dramatically reshapes and expands existing — and fiercely contested — US access rules that have been in place since 2013. federally funded items. behind a subscription paywall for up to 1 year.

Many commercial publishers and nonprofit scientific societies have long fought to maintain the year-long embargo, saying it is essential to protect subscription revenues that cover publishing and production costs and fund company activities. But critics of paywalls say they impede the free flow of information, have allowed price gouging by some publishers and force US taxpayers to “pay twice” – once to fund research and once to watch. the results. Since the late 1990s, critics have lobbied Congress and the White House to demand free and immediate “open access” to government-funded research.

The Biden administration has heeded those calls, though the new policy doesn’t expressly encompass the term open access — it uses the words “public access.” This is “a de facto open access mandate,” says Stefano Bertuzzi, CEO of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), which publishes 16 journals. And many open access advocates applaud it.

“It’s a huge step forward,” says Heather Joseph, executive director of the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition, one of the oldest open access advocacy groups in the United States. “Getting rid of this embargo is huge.”

The embargo and related policies “were sheer betrayals of the public interest”, tweeted molecular biologist Michael Eisen of the University of California at Berkeley, a prominent critic of access policies in the United States and co-founder of PLOS journals, which helped pioneer an open access business model in which authors pay a fee to make their articles immediately free for everyone. “The best thing I can say about this new policy is that publishers are going to hate it.”

Many publishers say they support a move to immediate public access but criticize the new US policy. “We would have preferred to chart our own course to open access without a government mandate,” says Bertuzzi. Six of ASM’s journals are already open access, with the others to follow by 2027.

The Association of American Publishers, a leading trade group, complained in a statement that the policy arrived “without formal and meaningful consultation or input from the public…on a decision that will have wide ramifications, including a serious economic impact”. (White House officials say they have met with publishers big and small over the past year to discuss the change.)

Others have taken a wait-and-see approach. Sudip Parikh, CEO of AAAS, which publishes the Science family of journals, says “it is too early to tell if this direction will have an impact on our journals”. (AAAS publishes a fully open access journal, Scientists progressand in 2021 its paywall Science journals began to allow authors to deposit near-final peer-reviewed manuscripts into institutional repositories upon publication.)

The impact of the new requirement could vary depending on which of the more than 20 US funding agencies are funding the author’s research. Each agency must finalize its policy by the end of 2024 and implement it by the end of 2025.

The policy is not intended to mandate a particular business model for publishing, Alondra Nelson, acting director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), said in an interview with ScienceInitiated. For example, it will not require federally funded researchers to publish only in paid open access journals. Researchers who publish in subscription journals might be able to satisfy the rule by depositing the near-final, peer-reviewed, accepted version in a public repository or other agency-approved outlet. Journals will still be able to keep their final, published version of an article behind a paywall. (But some scholars say that only the final published version is adequate for scientific purposes. Not-quite-final, “author-accepted” versions may lack final editing, typesetting, and formatted data tables. )

Nelson says the OSTP is acutely aware of concerns about who will pay the costs associated with the new policy, particularly if publication in a fee-paying journal becomes widespread practice. Some worry that US policy—combined with similar policies adopted in Europe and elsewhere—would accelerate the rise of such journals, ultimately making publication more difficult for authors with modest or no grants, especially those working in underfunded institutions and in developing countries.

The OSTP states in a blog post that it wants to “ensure that public access policies come with support for the most vulnerable members of the search ecosystem.” Agencies could, for example, allow researchers to use grant funds to cover open access publishing costs — as some already do — or could fund the expansion of public repositories, Nelson says. “We are not naive to the challenges we face,” she says. “The implementation of any new policy is essential.”

The new policy reflects the profound changes that have rocked academic publishing since the public access debate began in the United States more than 25 years ago. Second, subscription-print journals were the primary means of disseminating research results, and publishers fiercely resisted any policy changes that threatened an often highly profitable business model. But pressure from university libraries tired of paying escalating subscription fees and patient groups unhappy about having to pay to read taxpayer-funded biomedical studies have helped catalyze serious discussion about policy change. At the same time, the rise of the Internet has fueled publishing experiments, such as open access journals and the publication of freely accessible “preprints” that have not been peer reviewed.

In Washington, DC, these changes have prompted Republicans and Democrats to urge the federal government to revise its access policies. In 2013, then-President Barack Obama tried to find a compromise – via the one-year embargo rule – between publishers and open access advocates.

But many, including Biden, then Obama’s vice president, were unhappy with the deal. In a 2016 speech, for example, Biden noted, “Taxpayers fund $5 billion a year in cancer research, but once it’s out, almost all of that is behind it. [pay]walls. Tell me how it moves the [scientific] process faster.

Former President Donald Trump’s administration has also considered requiring immediate public access. And several developments in recent years have increased the pressure for an overhaul. In 2019, the US National Cancer Institute’s “Cancer Moonshot” research program, which Biden helped create under Obama, required recipients to write papers developed with its funding for free. In 2018, a group of European science funders called Coalition S unveiled a similar policy, which will come into full effect in January 2025. (Coalition S imposes an additional requirement that publishers waive copyright; policies existing and new articles do not.) And in 2020, the editors have agreed to make all articles relevant to COVID-19 open access, at least temporarily.

Now, the new US rules will apply to a substantial part of the world’s academic literature – and hundreds of thousands of new academic papers will be freely available to everyone without delay. In 2020, the OSTP estimates that federal research funds produced 195,000 to 263,000 published articles, or about 7% to 9% of the 2.9 million articles published worldwide that year. And because the policy now applies to any federal agency that funds research — not just those spending $100 million or more a year — the free material could also include work funded by national endowments for the arts. and the humanities. The OSTP says agencies could also decide that the rule covers other documents, such as book chapters and conference proceedings, that are peer-reviewed.

Analysts say it’s difficult to predict how the change will ultimately affect the finances of specific journals, publishers and researchers. In some journals, for example, only a small fraction of the articles might be the product of US funding. And academic libraries might still be willing to pay subscription fees, even if their faculty can read the same articles for free elsewhere, if publishers offer a better interface, search functions or other services.

Bertuzzi, however, says the new policy is likely to have a global impact that will be hard to ignore, as “the US government is the 800-pound gorilla in the room.”

Eric Choi is a longtime science fiction writer who specializes in “hard” science fiction and drawing true stories in space exploration.

Choi, is the winner of Aurora Awards in 2011 and 2015, twice receiving one of Canada’s top science fiction awards. Choi spoke with Space.com about the release of his recent collection, “Just Like Being There (opens in a new tab)(Springer Press, May 2022).

The 15 short stories are a collection of Choi’s work over the past 25 years, with each story ending with an afterword explaining the real-life inspiration behind the characters, plot, and other details.

Space.com recently caught up with Choi to discuss his new book and everything from “Star Trek” to Mars to how to use space as inspiration for compelling storytelling. Read on to see what he said.

Eric Choi is a Chartered Professional Engineer (P.Eng) with a BASc in Engineering Science and MASc in Aerospace Engineering, both from the University of Toronto, and an MBA from York University. In 2009, he was one of 40 finalists (out of 5,351 applicants) in the Canadian Space Agency’s astronaut recruitment campaign.

Space.com: How did you start telling stories?

Eric Choi: Throughout my life, science and science fiction have almost been like two sides of the same coin. Some of my earliest memories were of course early shuttle flights, including the first space shuttle mission, STS-1. Along with that was a longstanding interest in drawing inspiration from science fiction, including, of course, “Star Trek.” I was from that generation that wasn’t around when the original series aired in the 1960s. But when I was a kid, I remembered watching it in reruns.

I think my earliest memory of this show was this very unfortunate person in the red shirt, who was about to be consumed by an acid-secreting creature. I later learned that it was the classic “The Original Series” episode “The Devil in the Dark”, which really freaked me out. I progressed in my career as an engineer. I never gave up on the sci-fi aspects either.

The big breakthrough happened during my undergraduate studies in engineering science at the University of Toronto, where I entered a writing contest. It was then called the Isaac Asimov Prize; it’s now the Dell Magazines Award. To my surprise, I actually won first place in this contest the first year it was offered. It really shook things up for me.

Space.com: Let’s go story by story. We’ll start with Aurora Prize-winning “Crimson Sky” first. Can you talk about the scientific inspiration behind this?

Choi: The impetus behind this story dates back to my graduate studies at the Institute for Aerospace Studies at the University of Toronto. It has come to my attention that there are people out there thinking about what it would take to operate or fly a heavier than local atmospheric air vehicle in a harsh environment like Mars. [Editor’s note: The NASA Ingenuity mission is testing out drone flights on Mars right now.]

I took these concepts from academic publications and thought about what it would take to operate a raw version of these vehicles in the harsh Martian environment, and what the story is really about is a research mission and rescue on Mars.

Then I started thinking, we have things like paramedics on Earth, or people who have to administer first aid. How would this work in space or in a harsh planetary environment like Mars? If someone, for example, has injured their neck, how do you prepare it? You obviously can’t ask that person to take off their helmet, for example. How would you handle these things? How would you administer the medications? You can’t just stick a needle in someone’s arm very easily, when they’re wearing a spacesuit.

I was also interested in talking about the nature of exploration and pushing boundaries. In some ways, it was prescient and reflected some of the discussion and perhaps controversy surrounding some of the affluent people interested in spaceflight these days. I’m very happy that the story was well received.

Space.com: What was your inspiration for your short story, “Just Like Being There”, from which the anthology takes its name?

Choi: This was written for a previous anthology composed by [Canadian science fiction writer] Julie Czerneda. She is actually a biologist by training and was very interested in using science fiction to advance science awareness, education and literacy. She collected a series of books aimed at young readers that touched on or illustrated aspects of the science curriculum in colleges. [junior high] in Ontario. I wrote this story for this collection with the intention of exploring this eternal question of humans versus robots. What are the advantages and disadvantages?

The context is that it takes place in the near future where, due to a series of tragedies involving human exploration, it has been decided not to send people into space anymore. There’s a bit of a hands-on technology called Ansible, which is a communication device that comes from Ursula Le Guin. With this technology, we are able to eliminate one of the most serious obstacles in robotic exploration, namely the [communications] delay. When trying to operate a robotic system remotely, for example, on Mars or further out in the solar system, if you could somehow operate without delay in real time, regardless of location where you are in the solar system, it would be like being there, wouldn’t it?

It turns out that the story’s protagonist, his father, was one of the last people to explore Mars in person. So there is a little crisis. There is a small interpersonal conflict between the father and the son. I hope what I’ve done with the story is not just to illustrate some of the fascinating science behind planetary exploration, but perhaps to stimulate an interesting discussion of the relative pros and cons of human or robotic space exploration.

Space.com: The last story we’d like to talk about is “Heaven and Heaven.”

Choi: The context for this story comes from two places. In 2003, I had the opportunity to go down to Kennedy Space Center to witness the landing of STS-107, Columbia, which unfortunately and tragically did not happen. That experience has lingered and lingered with me all these years. A little more recently, in 2016, I had the opportunity to participate in a panel at the International Space University. One of the special events of this session was that the late widow of Ilan Ramon, the first Israeli astronaut killed on Columbia, was part of a distinguished panel. It moved me deeply too. I was impressed by the persistence, legacy and strength with which the memory of Ilan Ramon was kept alive in Israel.

I was thinking about how to combine these elements in an alternate history. What has been on my mind for many years, as I am sure in many people’s minds, could anything have been done to save the crew of STS 107? The answer to this question is yes, as it was actually well documented in the Columbia accident investigation report. A flight options assessment detailed two scenarios. One was a rescue scenario involving another shuttle, and the other was an attempt to repair damage in orbit with an EVA [extra-vehicular activity, or spacewalk.]

Thus, these two scenarios were sketched out in the Columbia investigation report. Really, these things were the genesis of the story. It’s in the kind of what they call an alternate history, or counterfactual. It took a lot of research to write this, but it was a very personal story. At the risk of being immodest, I’m quite proud of it. I’m glad this is the last story in my collection.

Space.com: If you’re writing science fiction for the first time, how do you approach a good story while respecting science and engineering as much as possible without sacrificing plot and all those storytelling devices?

Choi: If people are interested in writing, just do it. It’s not an easy thing. The first rule of writing by Robert A. Heinlein, American science fiction writer and space enthusiast (opens in a new tab) was if you want to be a writer, you have to write, and you have to finish what you write. If you can muster the courage to do it, put it out there for people to read and enjoy.

I tend to write in a subgenre known as hard science fiction. It’s the kind of story where if you took out the science element, there would be virtually no story. The prototypical example of this is “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley. The other aspect is that the science or engineering being described is either based on current understanding or a reasonable extrapolation from it.

Obviously, the genre of science fiction is much broader and more diverse than that. The alternate history I’ve written about in several of the stories in this book is arguably another subgenre of that, for example. I encompass these aspects of hard science fiction as well as alternate history, fantasy, or horror.

These stories truly become, to quote American science fiction writer Larry Niven, playgrounds of the mind. (opens in a new tab). It’s a bit of a mind’s playground to think about what might be possible in the near future. I like it because in the near future I hope people like you and me and many more will spend more time. It’s kind of nice to get a little preview of things that might be coming in the not too distant future.

Follow Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace (opens in a new tab). Follow us on twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in a new tab) Or on Facebook (opens in a new tab).

In 1989, after Iranian religious leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for the death of author Salman Rushdie, readings of his works were held in the United States. During this one in San Francisco, novelist Alice Walker reads aloud excerpts from Rushdie’s satanic verses.

Eric Risberg/Associated Press

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Eric Risberg/Associated Press

In 1989, after Iranian religious leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for the death of author Salman Rushdie, readings of his works were held in the United States. During this one in San Francisco, novelist Alice Walker reads aloud excerpts from Rushdie’s satanic verses.

Eric Risberg/Associated Press

In a small meeting room in midtown Manhattan in 1989, more than 20 prominent writers stood in turn to read aloud the work of writer Salman Rushdie and denounce the fatwa that had just ordered his dead.

At the time, the fatwa sparked an outpouring of support for Rushdie while sparking a debate about the complicated collision of art and free speech with offense.

Now, more than three decades later, those outpourings and debates have come to the fore again following a brutal stabbing attack on Rushdie during an arts and literary retreat in New York.

PEN America, the free-speech writers group, hosted Rushdie’s reading in 1989. Speakers then included writer Joan Didion, novelist Norman Mailer and essayist Christopher Hitchens, all of whom have denounced the fatwa in the name of freedom of expression.

“Censorship was imposed in the United States,” said biographer Robert Caro. “There are issues on which no compromise is possible, and this is one of them.”

But not all responses to the fatwa were such full-throated defenses of Rushdie. Perhaps more importantly, former President Jimmy Carter wrote an op-ed in The New York Times with a title proclaiming satanic verses be an “insult”.

“While Rushdie’s First Amendment freedoms are important, we have tended to promote him and his book without recognizing that it is a direct insult to those millions of Muslims whose sacred beliefs have been raped and suffer in restrained silence,” Carter wrote.

Commenting on Twitter in the days following last week’s attack on Rushdie, Iranian-American writer Roya Hakakian criticized a response from a US official. Later, while post a link to Carter’s 1989 op-edshe attributed what she called the abandonment of Rushdie and free speech to the “elites in 1989” and tweeted, “it is also the elites of today, who are laying all the foundations of today’s unsightly cancel culture”.

The attack on Rushdie comes at a time when libraries and schools are under immense pressure from conservatives to remove books about race and LGBTQ issues from their shelves. The publishing industry has also faced its share of criticism over representational issues in literary fiction and young adult books, as well as pressure to drop book deals with the likes of Republican Senator Josh. Hawley, Woody Allen and a Louisville, Ky., Police officer involved in the death of Breonna Taylor.

“When literature departments refuse to teach lolitalectures on Dostoyevsky are canceled following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Oscar winners feel comfortable slapping comedians on live television, journalists and cartoonists can be killed for publishing a thought or joke that offends their readers is a dangerous world for both artists and art itself,” Israeli writer Etgar Keret wrote this week.

Several writers, including Graeme Wood of Atlantic and David Rieffhave suggested that satanic verses might not have been published if it had been written today.

satanic verses, published in 1988, includes a section in which the Prophet Muhammad is tricked by Satan into proclaiming a revelation, the titular Satanic Verses, which he then has to retract. Because the sequence depicts the fallibility and human weakness of the prophet, the novel is considered blasphemous by some Muslims.

The year after the book was published, Iran’s religious leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued an order, known as a fatwa, calling for Rushdie’s death and the death of anyone involved in publishing the book. book.

Thereafter, Rushdie spent nearly a decade hiding under police protection. During these years, several publishers and translators were attacked, including the Japanese translator of the book, who was killed in 1991.

Rushdie gradually reappeared in public life in the early 2000s. He said he still received periodic threats as the fatwa had not been lifted. Over the years, hardliners in Iran have reportedly pooled a bounty totaling more than $3 million.

Last Friday, Rushdie, now 75, was preparing to speak at the retreat in New York when a man ran onto the stage and stabbed him 12 times in the neck, chest, stomach , by hand and by eye. Rushdie was hospitalized and his condition has since improved, his relatives said.

The assailant, a 24-year-old Lebanese-American, was charged with attempted murder. Iran has denied any involvement in the attack.

Now, on Friday, PEN America will host a new take on Rushdie’s 1989 reading: A group of writers will gather on the steps of the main branch of the New York Public Library to read passages from Rushdie’s writing in a show of support. The event will include Hakakian, as well as actor and comedian Aasif Mandvi, National Book Award winner Colum McCann and others.

“As publishers, we have a collective responsibility to support writers whose books and ideas ensure an open and ever-changing society,” said Markus Dohle, CEO of Rushdie’s publisher Penguin Random House, in a statement.

Welcome to Shelf Life, ELLE.com’s book column, where authors share their most memorable reads. Whether you’re looking for a book to comfort you, move you deeply, or make you laugh, consider a recommendation from the writers in our series, who, like you (because you’re here), love books. Maybe one of their favorite titles will also become one of yours.

A few weeks ago, first-time author Michelle Zauner celebrated a milestone: 52 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list (and still going strong) for his memoirs, Crying in H Mart (Knopf), about coping with his grief after losing his mother to cancer while cooking Korean food. Since its publication, it has apparently been in perpetual motion. Release of his third album, Jubilee, with his indie pop group Japanese Breakfast. Play Coachella, SXSW, Bonnaroo. Appearing in a Rodarte pre-fall campaign and a Levi’s x Free People ad. Manufacturing TimeThe 100 most influential people in listing. covering his single “Be Sweet” in simlish and composition the Sable video game soundtrack (she also has a game called Break Quest). Attending the Grammys as a double nominee dressed in Valentino. performing on SNL final. Throwing the first pitch during a New York Mets game. She is also writing the film adaptation of her book for Orion Pictures and right in the middle of a world Tour.

Born in Seoul, Eugene, Oregon, Brooklyn-based Zauner is an Aries, was the editor her college newspaper (she was thinking of doing journalism); was a competition chess fourth- to seventh-grade player; did Small office gig; once work locker room at Union Transfer in Philadelphia, which she sold five nights in a row; studied creative writing at Bryn Mawr; worked in advertising sales; got it first guitarr—a Yamaha acoustic—as a Christmas present from his mother; and dance at the carpenters Rainy days and Monday at his wedding.

Likes: Wilco, Cibo Matto and Karen O; dried cuttlefish and Kewpie mayonnaise (this last one is one of them) tattoos), Gwangjang Market in Seoul; Michael Imperioli (who appears in JBrekkie’s “Savage Good Boy” video); Café Reanimator Keystone blend. Do not like : Fusion kitchen, Trek.

The book that:

…should be included in all university curricula:

by Marilyn Robinson Housekeeping. I read this book in a novel-writing class at Bryn Mawr, and it completely changed me.

…helped me become a better writer:

by Richard Ford rock springs. I have re-read this book so many times. At one point, while I was reviewing Crying in H Mart, I picked it up and underlined all the phrases about the weather to figure out how to infuse more mood into my prose. It really is a master class in short fiction.

…I would love to be made into a Netflix show:

Frances Cha’s If I had your face. This novel is a real page-turner. It reads like a TV series, richly detailed and visually evocative.

…features a character I love to hate:

by Jane Austen Sense and sensitivity. In my opinion, John Willoughby is the ultimate fuckboy.

… grew on me:

At Megha Majumdar A burning. I don’t know why it didn’t appeal to me from the start, but a few chapters later I was hooked. I couldn’t put it down.

…helped me through a loss:

by Joan Didion The Year of Magical Thinking. A wonderful book on grief by a true master.

… presents the most beautiful jacket:

Last year on tour I picked up a beautiful vintage Charlotte Brontë hardcover Jane Eyrewhich features illustrations such as Procession of Lowood Orphan Girls in Gothic Dress.

… has the best title:

What are we talking about when we talk about love by Raymond Carver. Iconic. Unforgettable.

… made me laugh out loud:

by George Saunders Civilwarland in bad decline. George Saunders is hands down the funniest writer on the planet and an exceptional reader. I attended one of his lectures in college and was practically in tears.

…kept me up way too late:

At Jhumpa Lahiri’s In other words. I love Jhumpa Lahiri’s writing so much. His thoughts on language, education and belonging resonate so strongly with my current interests. Another book I couldn’t put down.

… currently sits on my bedside table:

I am currently reading a galley copy of The 12th Commandment by my former creative writing teacher, Daniel Torday. Daniel has been such a great friend and mentor to me. It is a pleasure to read it at its peak. The novel is an incredibly suspenseful detective story that revolves around a Jewish-Islamic cult in Columbus, Ohio.

…I recommend again and again:

MFK Fisher’s The gastronomic me. MFK Fisher’s food writing is spectacular and deeply inspired me while working on Crying in H Mart. She is so delicious, sensual, funny. Ahead of its time.

Read Zauner’s picks:

Household Picador

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Grove Press Rock Springs

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If I had your face

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Vintage The Year of Magical Thinking

Now 31% off

Penguin Classics Jane Eyre

Vintage What we talk about when we talk about love

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Random House Trade Paperbacks CivilWarLand in Bad Decline

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The vintage in other words

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Padma Lakshmi expresses her relief that ex-husband Salman Rushdie is improving after he was stabbed on stage before giving a speech on Friday August 12.

The ‘Top Chef’ host, 51, posted a heartfelt message on Twitter after learning that the author had been taken off a ventilator.

“Relieved @SalmanRushdie is doing fine after Friday’s nightmare,” she wrote on Sunday morning. “Worried and mute, can finally expire. Now let’s hope for a quick recovery.

Back to their marriage

Lakshmi and Rushdie were married from 2004 to 2007 after first meeting in 1999. It was her fourth marriage and her only.

“For us Indians, he’s like Hemingway,” Lakshmi told People magazine in 2016. I mean, he was the best thing that ever happened to me by far. The fact that someone of that stature and caliber even cared enough about me to want to take me out to lunch was pretty incredible.

Lakshmi’s undiagnosed severe endometriosis resulted in chronic pain. That’s what she says led to their divorce.

“Endometriosis was definitely a big reason my marriage failed and I don’t think any of us understood that at the time,” she told the publication. “I think it’s also because I hid it to some degree, not intentionally but you know, it’s weird talking about your period all the time. It’s like the least sexy thing in the world to do.

“I think Salman took it personally and I think he felt rejected,” she said. “I can understand that.”

The couple have remained good friends and he even supported her by sharing intimate details of their marriage when she released her memoir in 2016.

“I said to him, ‘I just want you to know that I’m talking about the end of our marriage and I’m talking about it because I really wanted to talk about endometriosis and also that you were a big part of my life,'” Lakshmi said. “And he said, ‘You have the right to tell your side of the story as you see it.’

“I mean, listen, he’s the most famous proponent of free speech,” she added. “Besides, he’s a big boy. He can handle it.”

“His usual fiery and provocative sense of humor remains intact”

On Friday, the 75-year-old novelist was attacked and stabbed in the neck in New York. Rushdie was about to give a lecture at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua when a man approached him.

An Associated Press reporter who witnessed the scene in rural New York said Rushdie fell to the ground and the man was restrained.

Authorities said Rushdie was airlifted by helicopter to a local hospital. Police also confirmed the writer underwent surgery after being stabbed a dozen times.

On Sunday, Rushdie’s son, Zafar, sent a statement to NBC News about his father’s condition.

“Following Friday’s attack, my father remains in critical condition in hospital and is receiving intensive medical care,” he began. “We are extremely relieved that yesterday he was taken off the ventilator and supplemental oxygen and was able to say a few words.”

He continued: “Although his life-changing injuries are severe, his usual fiery and defiant sense of humor remains intact. We are very grateful to all members of the public who bravely jumped to his (defense) and administered first aid with the police and doctors who cared for him and for the outpouring of love and support from around the world .

Zafar Rushdie concluded his statement by asking for patience and privacy for his family.

NBC News reported that the suspect – who has been identified as Hadi Matar, 24, of Fairview, New Jersey – has been charged with attempted second-degree murder as well as second-degree assault for injuring the show’s moderator. ‘event.

A spokesperson for the Chautauqua County District Attorney said Rushdie’s injuries include stab wounds to the neck and chest and others to the face and abdomen that punctured his eye and liver, according to NBC News.

Chautauqua County District Attorney Jason Schmidt also told NBC News the suspect was being held without bail at the Chautauqua County Jail.

A lawyer for Matar pleaded not guilty on his behalf, NBC News reported.

Rushdie has been the target of death threats since the 1980s when he published his book “The Satanic Verses”. In 1989, Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa – or edict – calling for the author’s death because of the novel’s content, which Iran deemed blasphemous to Islam. Thereafter, the writer and his family spent nearly a decade living underground.

According to the Associated Press, a $3.3 million bounty has been put on Rushdie’s head by an Iranian religious organization for anyone who kills him.