Jennifer Clement grew up in 1960s Mexico City living next door to Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera. It was a bohemian childhood alongside artists, communists, revolutionaries and poets, one that, thanks to her markedly absent parents, allowed an awakening of a creative freedom and curiosity about the world. Passionate about dance, Clement left behind the revolutions in Latin America and took up a place at dance school in New York City in 1981. She quickly becomes a fixture in the art scene of the early 80s inhabiting the world of Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring, Colette Lumiere, and William Burroughs, among others, and frequenting The Mudd Club, Danceteria and Studio 54. From the author of Widow Basquiat, this memoir recreates the fury, ecstasy and danger that made '70s Mexico City and 80's New York two of the greatest places to be living, young and free.

'I believe that despite the enormous odds which exist, unflinching, unswerving, fierce intellectual determination, as citizens, to define the real truth of our lives and our societies is a crucial obligation which devolves upon us all. It is in fact mandatory.' Harold Pinter, English PEN President and Literature Nobel 2005 PEN - 'Poets, Essayists, Novelists' - was founded in London in 1921 to promote friendship, intellectual co-operation and exchange between writers from around the world. It has since become a worldwide network of writers, a community extended to more than 100 countries who for 100 years has worked to celebrate all literatures without exception and protect freedom of expression. What was PEN's role in shaping the very concept of human rights even before it was adopted by the United Nations in 1948? How did PEN develop fundamental ideas on free speech as well as the equality of languages and literatures? This book tells the extraordinary story of how writers from around the world placed the celebration of literature and the defence of free speech at the centre of humanity's struggle against repression and terror. From opposing book burning and the persecution of writers in Nazi Germany, to supporting dissident writers during the Cold War and campaigning for imprisoned writers in China today, PEN has worked to safeguard against all kinds of censorship and self-censorship. The extraordinary writers who have been PEN cases is a history of bravery and include Federico Garcia Lorca, Stefan Zweig, Musine Kokalari, Wole Soyinka, Salman Rushdie, Ngugi wa Thiong'o, Anna Politkovskaya, Hrant Dink and Svetlana Alexievich. Those writers' voices, and those of the many others who have battled to uphold the opening phrase of PEN's Charter - 'Literature knows no frontiers' - are still very much with us. Without them, PEN International could not have become the strong, vibrant, active movement it is today.

MADONNA. ANDY WARHOL. KEITH HARING. FAB 5 FREDDIE. DEBBIE HARRY. JULIAN SCHNABEL. Jean-Michel Basquiat's transition from the subways to the chic gallery spaces of Manhattan brought the artist into the company of many of New York's established and aspiring stars. Unable to deal with the demands that his new fame brought, in 1988, at the age of twenty-seven Basquiat, the most successful black visual artist in history, died from a heroin overdose. Widow Basquiat is an exploration of the artist as seen through the eyes of his muse, Suzanne. It is a love story like no other.

While humility is not especially valued in modern Western culture, Jennifer Clement argues here, it is central to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century understandings of Christian faith and behavior, and is vital to early modern concepts of the self. As this study shows, early modern literary engagements with humility link it to self-knowledge through the practice of right reading, and make humility foundational to any proper understanding of human agency. Yet humility has received little critical interest, and has often been misunderstood as a false virtue that engenders only self-abjection. This study offers an overview of various ways in which humility is discussed, deployed, or resisted in early modern texts ranging from the explicitly religious and autobiographical prose of Katherine Parr and John Donne, to the more politically motivated prose of Queen Elizabeth I and the seventeenth-century reformer and radical Thomas Tryon. As part of the wider 'turn to religion' in early modern studies, this study seeks to complicate our understanding of a mainstream early modern virtue, and to problematize a mode of critical analysis that assumes agency is always defined by resistance.

While humility is not especially valued in modern Western culture, Jennifer Clement argues here, it is central to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century understandings of Christian faith and behavior, and is vital to early modern concepts of the self. As this study shows, early modern literary engagements with humility link it to self-knowledge through the practice of right reading, and make humility foundational to any proper understanding of human agency. Yet humility has received little critical interest, and has often been misunderstood as a false virtue that engenders only self-abjection. This study offers an overview of various ways in which humility is discussed, deployed, or resisted in early modern texts ranging from the explicitly religious and autobiographical prose of Katherine Parr and John Donne, to the more politically motivated prose of Queen Elizabeth I and the seventeenth-century reformer and radical Thomas Tryon. As part of the wider 'turn to religion' in early modern studies, this study seeks to complicate our understanding of a mainstream early modern virtue, and to problematize a mode of critical analysis that assumes agency is always defined by resistance.

A haunting story of love and survival that introduces an unforgettable literary heroine
Ladydi Garcia Martinez is fierce, funny and smart. She was born into a world where being a girl is a dangerous thing. In the mountains of Guerrero, Mexico, women must fend for themselves, as their men have left to seek opportunities elsewhere. Here in the shadow of the drug war, bodies turn up on the outskirts of the village to be taken back to the earth by scorpions and snakes. School is held sporadically, when a volunteer can be coerced away from the big city for a semester. In Guerrero the drug lords are kings, and mothers disguise their daughters as sons, or when that fails they "make them ugly" - cropping their hair, blackening their teeth- anything to protect them from the rapacious grasp of the cartels. And when the black SUVs roll through town, Ladydi and her friends burrow into holes in their backyards like animals, tucked safely out of sight.
While her mother waits in vain for her husband's return, Ladydi and her friends dream of a future that holds more promise than mere survival, finding humor, solidarity and fun in the face of so much tragedy. When Ladydi is offered work as a nanny for a wealthy family in Acapulco, she seizes the chance, and finds her first taste of love with a young caretaker there. But when a local murder tied to the cartel implicates a friend, Ladydi's future takes a dark turn. Despite the odds against her, this spirited heroine's resilience and resolve bring hope to otherwise heartbreaking conditions.
An illuminating and affecting portrait of women in rural Mexico, and a stunning exploration of the hidden consequences of an unjust war, PRAYERS FOR THE STOLEN is an unforgettable story of friendship, family, and determination.

"From the Hardcover edition."

The beautifully written, deeply affecting story of Jean-Michel Basquiat's partner, her past, and their life together
New York City in the 1980s was a mesmerizing, wild place. A hotbed for hip hop, underground culture, and unmatched creative energy, it spawned some of the most significant art of the 20th century. It was where Jean-Michel Basquiat became an avant-garde street artist and painter, swiftly achieving worldwide fame. During the years before his death at the age of 27, he shared his life with his lover and muse, Suzanne Mallouk.
A runaway from an unhappy home in Canada, Suzanne first met Jean-Michel in a bar on the Lower East Side in 1980. Thus began a tumultuous and passionate relationship that deeply influenced one of the most exceptional artists of our time.
In emotionally resonant prose, award-winning author Jennifer Clement tells the story of the passion that swept Suzanne and Jean-Michel into a short-lived, unforgettable affair. A poetic interpretation like no other, "Widow Basquiat" is an expression of the unrelenting power of addiction, obsession and love.

`La suave patria’ is often regarded as the Mexican national poem, an extraordinary tour-de-force that would change forever the way that poetry would develop in Mexico. It was one of the last works by Ramón López Velarde, who died of pneumonia at the age of only 33 in 1921, and is the work for which he is most remembered today. After his death, his reputation took some time to grow, but his later espousal by major figures such Xavier Villaurrutia and Octavio Paz has ensured that he will remain central to the story of Mexican 20th century literature. The translation offered here, by poet-novelist (and current President of PEN International), Jennifer Clement, is a remarkable achievement and brings the poem into English for a new generation of readers. The poem is contextualised in an essay by the Mexican poet, Luis Miguel Aguilar, and is embellished by a startling suite of paintings by Gustavo Monroy, from his `New Screen of the Conquest’—a 21st-century companion work to the original folding `Screen of the Conquest and View of the City of Mexico’, an anonymous work from the late 17th century which measures some 2.1 meters high by 5.5 meters wide. Monroy’s brutally ironic modern equivalent stands in the same museum as the original screen.

This is the first collection in the UK for Mexican poet Victor Manuel Mendiola, although his work has been appearing in small-press editions, in others' collections and in journals for some time. His collected poems 1987-2002, Tan oro y negro (UNAM, Mexico City), won New York's Premio Latino de Literatura (Latino Literature Prize) in 2005. This Selected shows the full range of his work, but begins with his astonishing erotic long poem 'Tu Mano Mi Boca' (Your Hand, My Mouth), which was so well received in Ruth Fainlight's translation when it was included in her latest collection of poems.

Jennifer Clement studied English Literature and Anthropology at New York University and French Literature in Paris. Clement is the author of the memoir 'Widow Basquiat', which made the UK Booksellers' Choice list, and a novel 'A True Story Based on Lies', which was a finalist in the Orange Prize for Fiction. She was awarded the Canongate Prize for New Writing in 2001, and is also the author of several books of poetry: 'The Next Stranger', 'Newton's Sailor', and 'Lady of the Broom', each published in bilingual editions in Mexico. Clement's work has been translated into eight languages. Canongate Books is publishing her next novel 'The Poison That Fascinates' in 2008. Jennifer Clement lives in Mexico City and, with her sister Barbara Sibley, is co-director and -founder of the annual San Miguel Poetry Week. The present volume offers several new poems, the complete 'Lady of the Broom' sequence, plus selections from her two earlier books.

**Longlisted for the National Book Award for Fiction 2018** 'Haunting ... poetic ... Full of sorrow and aching sweetness' Washington Post Gun Love is a hypnotic story of family, community and violence. Told from the perspective of a sharp-eyed teenager, it exposes America's love affair with firearms and its painful consequences. 'My mother called anyone or anything that seemed alone, or ended up in the wrong place, a stray. There were stray people, stray dogs, stray bullets, and stray butterflies.' Fourteen-year-old Pearl France lives in the front seat of a broken down car and her mother Margot lives in the back. Together they survive on a diet of powdered milk and bug spray, love songs and stolen cigarettes. Life on the edge of a Florida trailer park is strange enough, but when Pastor Rex's 'Guns for God' programme brings Eli Redmond to town Pearl's world is upended. Eli pays regular visits to Margot in the back seat, forcing Pearl to find a world beyond the car. Margot is given a gift by Eli, a gun of her own, just like he's given her flowers. It sits under the driver's seat, a dark presence... 'One of those rare books that the reader might wish to be a few dozen pages longer, to spend more time in this fully realised world ' Observer *Soon to be a film adaptation directed by Julie Taymor*

'Now we make you ugly,' my mother said. 'The best thing you can be in Mexico is an ugly girl.' On the mountainside in rural Mexico where Ladydi lives, being a girl is dangerous. Especially a pretty one. If the Narcos hear there is a pretty girl on the mountain, they steal her. So when the black SUVs roll into town, Ladydi and her friends hide in the warren of holes scattered across the mountain, safely out of sight. Because the stolen girls don't come back. Ladydi is determined to get out, to find a life that offers more than just the struggle to survive. But she soon finds that the drug cartels have eyes everywhere, and the cities are no safer than the mountains.