This is an age of manifest – and manifested – sensitivities. We are alerted to cultural, sexual and medical improprieties of expression. We need to protect readers, as listeners and viewers are generally protected, against what may shock or unsettle them. Radio listeners are warned of the proximity of ‘strong language’ (which indicates obscenity or aggression, a rather gendered notion of ‘strong’); television viewers are cautioned against flashing lights which might set off a life-threatening reflex, but also alerted to nudity and sometimes to sexual content. If they choose to over-ride trigger warnings and something they see or hear unsettles them, they’re provided with numbers to call or websites to visit. They can be repaired after damage or comforted after hurt. Soap operas are especially considerate in this way.

Magazines, newspapers, books and social media are now commonly in the firing line, though they often hold the gun to their own heads and hearts. To read modern apologies from those who offend, or fear they may have offended, is like reading accounts of abasement in imperial Rome. If you fell foul of the Emperor, you demeaned yourself, and when you could go no lower you finished yourself off, leaving your estate to your master. Nero’s great tutor Seneca is a startling example, having taken obedience and obeisance to the nth degree. The emperor was generally unaccountable, until the Praetorian Guard turned. When a modern writer is caught out, there are often in print accounts to settle.

The different types of rhetoric surrounding the case of Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me (2019) by the poet, anthologist and teacher Kate Clanchy are familiar. She deployed – unmaliciously, but carelessly – epithets in her book which propagated racial and other stereotypes. An attentive editor might have queried them, but no such person was on hand. Few critics noticed them when the book appeared, was widely praised, and received the Orwell Prize for political writing, becoming a best-seller. When, earlier this year, readers began to question the poet’s specific language on Goodreads, they were themselves – Chimene Suleyman, Monisha Rajesh and Professor Sunny Singh in particular – stereotyped and denounced in the social media.

This helped characterise the poet’s support culture as itself racist, especially when, after first denying that she had used the epithets she was taxed with, she had to climb down – because they were there in her book in black and white. There followed a rush for the exit: individuals and journals that had given her support or editorial houseroom turned on her and then began to mea culpa themselves. The poet, too, undertook an act of public contrition. It will culminate in her rewriting the offending passages and maybe undertaking a more comprehensive rewrite of her book. She may add a new chapter reflecting on her learning curve, inviting us to share her awakening.

A few months ago Poetry Wales conducted an interview with the poet, addressing her as ‘neurodivergent’. On 9 August they posted an apology ‘in regards to [sic] the publication of a conversation with Kate Clanchy in the Summer 2021 edition of the magazine’. ‘We are appalled to have since learned that, in her book Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me (Picador, 2019), Clanchy uses language and descriptions that we and many others know to be racist and ableist.’ They had not read the book in advance of the interview, it would seem, like many of her admirers and critics. In the interview, she did not express racist or ableist views, so it might have been inferred that Poetry Wales’ readers had been spared. Instead of undertaking In future to do their homework – due preparation, due diligence – and read the books of their interviewees, they proposed a more elaborate approach. ‘In line with our work to make our magazine a welcoming and inclusive space, we are establishing new policies to help guide everyone involved in the production, oversight, and management of Poetry Wales to ensure that the content of the magazine truly reflects our aims. A statement and article about this will appear in the forthcoming issue of the magazine. We will continue to work hard to make poetry and poetry resources more accessible, welcoming, and inclusive.’ Abjection follows: ‘We apologise to our contributors and readers, to everyone who has trusted us, and to all who have been harmed and hurt by Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me. In publishing the conversation with Clanchy, we contributed to the distress of peers, strangers, and friends. We have undermined our own values by publishing this item, making our magazine a less safe space, especially for writers of colour, disabled writers, and neurodivergent writers, which is entirely the reverse of our aims. Poetry Wales condemns all forms of discrimination including racism, ableism, sexism, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, Islamophobia, and Antisemitism.’

Clanchy – after claiming she had been misquoted – realised she was on a hiding to nothing. She, too, mea culpaed: ‘I am not a good person. I do try to say that in my book. Not a pure person, not a patient person, no one’s saviour. You are right to blame me, and I blame myself.’ Philip Pullman initially defended the poet and said her detractors might ‘find a comfortable home in Isis or the Taliban’. When he realised his mistake, he exclaimed, ‘Completely my fault. I should have read the whole thread. I apologise for my haste and intemperate language.’

Picador, the book’s publisher, also apologised, twice – first mildly, then vehemently. It said it was listening to the conversations the book had given rise to and was ’profoundly sorry’ for the hurt caused to those who had ‘engaged with the text’ (i.e., read) ‘to hold us to account’. ‘We realise our response was too slow. We vigorously condemn the despicable online bullying of many of those who have spoken out. This has no place in our community. We understand that readers wish to know specifically what will be done about the book, we’re actively working on this now and we will communicate this as soon as possible.’ The accumulation of adverbs is an index of contrition.


Set this domestic calling to account, which exposed some unreflective aspects of our contemporary publishing culture, alongside recent developments in other countries. Substantial institutions, religious and political, and the state itself, are putting pressure on publishers and writers – not locally corrective but more fundamentally intended. During lockdown, people had time to read, and those in power had time to oversee and correct their reading. In October last year 847 examples of censorship in various countries were identified by the International Publishers’ Association in their report Freedom to Publish: Challenges, Violations and Countries of Concern. These countries included Hungary, Poland, Russia, Belarus, Serbia, China, Iran, but also France, the UK and the USA. Over half the censorship was perpetrated by governments directly or obliquely. Instances of censorship continue unabated. The targets in Eastern Europe in particular are LGBTQ+ writers and books. Russia leads the way in European censorship, having passed the ‘anti-LGBTQ propaganda’ law in 2012. Belarus is a vivid flash-point, with the local chapter of International PEN having been disbanded for having exposed 621 human rights violations in a report.

There are many ways of censoring books. Central control of paper supply can be used to penalise publishers who take wrong turnings, as in Venezuela – and Russia. Turkish authorities demand that every book sold in a bookshop should have a sticker declaring it ‘authentic’. This is not only to defeat piracy: it is an obvious form of regulation.

One effect of censorship, oblique or manifest, is that it leads to protective self-censorship, not only among librarians and publishers but among writers themselves. Writers’ groups can become regulatory. The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) has more than 22,000 members around the world. In July it issued ‘a fervent apology to Muslim and Palestinian members over a recent condemnation of antisemitism that did not discuss Islamophobia, and announced the resignation of the diversity officer who had posted the message.’ The offending SCBWI statement on antisemitism, published in June, affirmed that Jews ‘have the right to life, safety, and freedom from scapegoating and fear’. Noting the rise in antisemitism and antisemitic violence, it said, ‘Silence is often mistaken for acceptance and results in the perpetration of more hatred and violence against different types of people.’

We can be grateful to Chimene Suleyman, Monisha Rajesh, Professor Sunny Singh and others for rejecting silence. What they taught us is valuable going forward.

Letter

On the translation of ‘Ouvroir de littérature potentielle’ in the article on the Oulipo group

‘Workshop of potential literature’ is a good, but debatable translation. It does cling to ‘first meanings’ of the originals, which are perhaps not intended. A French workshop is properly un atelier, which is also a studio. An ouvroir is a workspace or sewing corner. The atelier of a craftsman would produce finished goods; an ouvroir is a transitory, domestic, and less formal environment. The ‘first meaning’ of the word ‘potentiel’ is certainly English ‘potential’, as in ‘possible’.  But its more philosophical denotation is ‘aspiring’, ‘imminent’ or ‘aspirational’.

Thus, perhaps one other translation would be ‘Workspace for imminent writing’. – W. Bruno

A Note on the Cover

After two years of restraint, PN Review is returning to pictorial covers. This and the next five issues (the whole of Volume 48) will have cover images by poet and artist Gregory O’Brien. His poems have been published in PNR and he has provided vivid cover images down the decades, starting with PNR 111, ‘Aviator Fallen in a Desert’, acrylic and ink on paper (September–October 1996, exactly twenty­-five years ago).