Jane Austen wrote about private lives, nary a hint of the Napoleonic Wars. Not an option for writers today; the public world intrudes, Salman Rushdie reminded us in his welcome at Wednesday night's "Public Lives/Private Lives" reading at Town Hall. (Rushdie began with a warm "You're back!" The PEN World Voice Fest he launched four years ago has legs.)  Rushdie, who later described himself as "the punctuation," knows how to get on and off stage with dispatch. A noble gift.

Highlights of the evening:

 Before launching into a poem and an excerpt from his latest novel, Divisadero, Michael Ondaatje quoted Kinky Friedman: "There is a fine line between fiction and nonfiction, and I believe ... I snorted it in 1976," drawing a few snorts from the audience.

Rushing onstage, Annie Prioux, announced she was not...