Hillary Clinton to Speak at PEN World Voices Festival

PEN America has announced that Hillary Clinton will deliver the closing lecture at this year’s PEN World Voices Festival, capping off a week of events dedicated to the theme “Resist and Reimagine” and featuring more than 165 writers of over 50 nationalities.

Clinton, who served as secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, will deliver the Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture on April 22 at the Great Hall at Cooper Union in New York City.

The speech, according to a news release, “will draw on her experience as the nation’s top diplomat and her career in politics to underline the centrality of free speech — broadly defined and vociferously defended — in sustaining healthy democracies and vibrant societies.”

After the lecture, Clinton will be joined onstage by Nigerian-born novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (who delivered the lecture in 2015) for a dialogue about the future of women and girls around the world.

In addition to Adichie, past Freedom to Write lecturers have included Orhan Pamuk, Salman Rushdie, Wole Soyinka, Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Masha Gessen.

Tickets and more information are available at worldvoicesfestival.org.