Sarah Jessica Parker to be honored this spring by PEN America
NEW YORK (AP) — Sarah Jessica Parker will be this year's recipient of PEN America's 'Literary Service Award.' The 'Sex and the City' star, a longtime advocate for reading and literacy, will be honored May 15 at the free expression organization's annual spring gala.
Jon Yaged, CEO of Macmillan Publishers, will receive the 'Business Visionary Award.'
Parker has been involved in numerous literary projects, whether as founder of her own publishing imprint or serving as executive producer of the anti-book banning documentary 'The Librarians,' which premiered last month at the Sundance Film Festival.
The PEN/Audible Literary Service Award had previously been given to an 'important writer' who has attracted a wide audience and 'helped us understand the human condition,' with previous winners including Stephen Sondheim and Toni Morrison. The criteria is now 'a writer or advocate who has served the literary community through their words or work.'
'We are now at a crisis point with books by underrepresented writers being pulled from school libraries and classrooms,' PEN co-CEO Clarisse Rosaz Shariyf said in a statement released Friday. 'Sarah Jessica Parker is pushing back against these bans as an indispensable defender of the freedom to read and by shining a light on exceptional new voices of American contemporary literature through her publishing imprint SJP Lit.'
As head of Macmillan, Yaged publishes authors ranging from Sally Rooney and Kristin Hannah to S.A. Cosby and Michael Wolff. The business visionary award is given for 'outstanding leadership' that 'embraces the power of literature to shape democratic and humane values.'
PEN co-CEO Summer Lopez praised Yaged for his 'eloquence and force' in opposing book bans and other restrictions.
'For decades, Jon has been a stalwart defender of the right to read and a champion of ensuring publishing represents diverse voices and perspectives, understanding the fundamental role of these values in a democratic society,' Lopez said in a statement. 'We are honored to give him the spotlight as a 'visionary' for his big-hearted, expansive, and principled approach to literary publishing.'
A former Macmillan CEO, John Sargent, is among the previous winners of the business award, along with former publishing executives Markus Dohle of Penguin Random House, Michael Pietsch of Hachette Book Group and Caroline Reidy of Simon and Schuster.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Geek Girl Authority
41 minutes ago
- Geek Girl Authority
Sneak A Peek at THE LIBRARIANS: THE NEXT CHAPTER "And the Memory Crystal"
Are you hooked on The Librarians: The Next Chapter yet? We're only four episodes into the inaugural season, and our rag-tag found family of magic herders has already redeemed a drekavac, defeated a witch, solved a ghost story, and brought Cupid out of retirement. Talk about keeping busy. Next up is 'And the Memory Crystal,' and we've got a sneak peek clip for you! RELATED: Read our recaps of The Librarians: The Next Chapter For those of you not yet on this supernatural party wagon, The Librarians: The Next Chapter is the sequel series to The Librarians series, which spun off from the three The Librarian films starring Noah Wyle. In The Librarians: The Next Chapter, Vikram Chamberlain (Callum McGowan), a Librarian from 1847, inadvertently releases magic across the European continent in 2025 when he attempts to return to his own time. Banded together with a historian, a scientist, and a Guardian, he has six months to fix it. Photograph by Aleksandar Letic The Librarians: The Next Chapter, 'And the Memory Crystal' As teased by the TNT website, in the next adventure, ' the team goes to a college campus with a world-class observatory to discover who is using the Crystal of Dr. John Dee to steal people's memories, in order to own the future.' And — because who doesn't love a deep dive? — Here's the scoop on John Dee's Crystal: John Dee served as Queen Elizabeth I's court astronomer and alchemist. On his advice, England established colonies throughout the New World. He had one of the largest libraries in England (fittingly) and, like Connor (Bluey Robinson), left his comfortable court position to dig deeper into the occult and supernatural. He claimed the angel Uriel gave him his crystal in 1582 and used it for curing diseases, seeing the future, and spiritual communication. RELATED: Dean Devlin Dishes on The Librarians: The Next Chapter 's Magical Homecoming John Dee's story ends tragically, dying alone and impoverished, denied a return to court when James I succeeded Elizabeth I. His burial site is unknown. However, John Dee's Crystal currently resides in the Science Museum Group Collection in London. The Value of Memory In the sneak peek clip below, Vikram gets on a righteous soapbox about what he sees as the modern world's greatest failing — people's dependence on technology. Lysa (Olivia Morris) triggers the tirade by discounting the worth of memories. She postulates that they take up cognitive space in the brain that could be better utilized for something productive. Vikram scolds her, Connor, Charlie (Jessica Green), and all their contemporaries for giving away their humanity to the machines. 'No need to think, to know, to remember ANYTHING!' he chastises, shaking her cell phone at them. RELATED: Olivia Morris Shares How The Librarians: The Next Chapter Hooked Her From Page One He predicts technology will consume everything humankind has ever created. Eventually, it'll even take over human emotions. It's a grand, rousing speech, but it is immediately undercut by a passing student's description of his memory loss. The condition is spreading, and that can't be good. The Librarians: The Next Chapter Season 1 Episode 5, 'And the Memory Crystal,' airs on TNT on Monday, June 16 at 9 pm ET . On Location: The Belgrade Fortress on TNT's THE LIBRARIANS: THE NEXT CHAPTER Diana lives in Vancouver, BC, Canada, where she invests her time and energy in teaching, writing, parenting, and indulging her love of all Trek and a myriad of other fandoms. She is a lifelong fan of smart sci-fi and fantasy media, an upstanding citizen of the United Federation of Planets, and a supporter of AFC Richmond 'til she dies. Her guilty pleasures include female-led procedurals, old-school sitcoms, and Bluey. She teaches, knits, and dreams big. You can also find her writing at The Televixen, Women at Warp, TV Fanatic, and TV Goodness.
San Francisco Chronicle
an hour ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Dutch beach beasts find a final resting place in a new exhibition
DELFT, Netherlands (AP) — The famous wind-powered beach beasts have scuttled along the Dutch North Sea coast, into a swanky Miami art show and even onto 'The Simpsons.' Now. they have a final resting place in a Dutch city most famous for 'Girl with a Pearl Earring' painter Johannes Vermeer and blue-painted pottery. The 'bones' of Theo Jansen's 'strandbeesten' — beach animals in Dutch — have taken over a former cable factory in Delft, the small city in the western Netherlands that Jansen has called home for decades. 'During the years, there has been a sort of evolutionary history, you could say. And you could see these animals as sort of natural historical objects,' the 77-year old artist told The Associated Press before the installation's opening. The Strandbeesten Mortuary, as the exhibition is called, follows the various versions of the mobile sculptures since 1990 when Jansen created the first one from plastic pipes and tape. As the animals evolved, Jansen incorporated plastic bottles, wooden planks, cloth and cardboard. The life and death cycle of these famous animals — formed mostly out of PVC pipes — has left behind an impressive fossil record, which is on display at the exhibition. Marloes Koster, who organized the exhibition for Delft's Prinsenhof Museum, said that Jansen's ultimate goal is to create a beast that will live forever. 'He's not there yet, so these are the ones that didn't make it,' she added. The museum is undergoing major renovations, so Koster and her colleagues have been putting together arts and culture events at alternative venues around the city while the building is shut. Born near the North Sea, Jansen grew up captivated by the wind that often hits the Dutch coastline. He harnessed it to allow his animals to 'walk' along the beach. Every year, he creates a new strandbeest and, at the end of the summer, declares the animal dead. 'All summer I do experiments, and in the fall I'm a little bit wiser (about) how these animals should survive in the future,' Jansen said. Many of the visitors to the opening of the exhibition had followed Jansen's work for years and were keen to understand how the strandbeesten had changed over time. 'You see a kind of development in the way he does things. So they start out very simple, and then it gets increasingly complicated. So they evolve,' said Cor Nonhof, a Delft local who had come to see the exhibition with his wife. 'I cannot do anything else,' Jansen said. 'And I am very happy with that.'
San Francisco Chronicle
an hour ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
AP PHOTOS: BTS stars Jimin and Jung Kook discharged from military service
YEONCHEON, South Korea (AP) — Hundreds of fans gathered Wednesday to catch a glimpse of K-pop superstars Jimin and Jung Kook, the latest and final members of BTS to be discharged from South Korea's mandatory military service. Supporters traveled from around the world to the public sports ground where the meet-and-greet took place. Color-wrapped buses bearing BTS members' faces lined the streets while red and yellow balloons floated above and a decorated food truck provided free coffee and water, adding to the festive atmosphere. A day earlier, RM and V each saluted upon their release in Chuncheon City as about 200 fans, some of whom traveled from Mexico, Turkey and Brazil, cheered. Jin, the oldest member of the K-pop supergroup, was discharged from the army in June 2024. J-Hope was discharged in October. The seventh member, Suga, is fulfilling his duty as a social service agent, an alternative to military service. The seven BTS members plan to reunite as a group sometime in 2025. Anaesi, a fan from Portugal, displayed a colorful tattoo featuring a golden shield emblazoned with 'ARMY,' along with BTS members' names in Korean. She said the group 'saved' her from depression. 'So for me BTS is my angel,' she said. ___ This is a photo gallery curated by AP photo editors.
