August 4, 2004 | Cooper Union's Great Hall | New York City

Fifteen literary luminaries gathered before a full house at New York City's Cooper Union to present a series of readings on the topics of free speech and democracy, in concert with the PEN Campaign for Core Freedoms. In addition to a crowd that stood for hours in a line that circled Cooper Union several times, the event reached a coast-to-coast audience through radio and television broadast.

In front of a packed house, writers  Laurie Anderson, Paul Auster, Russell Banks, Don DeLillo, Ariel Dorfman, Eve Ensler, Jonathan Safran Foer, Barbara Goldsmith, A. M. Homes, Margo Jefferson, Edward P. Jones, Walter Dean Myers, Francine Prose, Salman Rushdie, and Monique Truong read from texts they chose around the theme "State of Emergency." 

LISTEN TO SEGMENTS
 • Laurie Anderson reading David Hickey: "My Weimar" in Air Guitar: Essays on Art and Democracy

• Paul Auster reading Henry David Thoreau: "Slavery in Massachusetts"

• Russell Banks reading Mark Twain: "The Person Sitting in Darkness"

• Don DeLillo reading Zbiegnew Herbert

• Ariel Dorfman reading Cervantes: Don Quixote (Spanish and English)

• Eve Ensler reading Nawal el Saadwi

• Jonathan Safran Foer reading from President Bush quotes

• Barbara Goldsmith reading Susan B. Anthony: statement after being sentenced for voting in 1872 election

• A. M. Homes reading Lawrence Ferlinghetti: "Coney Island"

• Margo Jefferson reading Zora Neale Hurston: "Seeing the World as It Is" and James Baldwin: "The Devil Finds Work"

• Edward P. Jones reading Dalton Trumbo: Johnny Got His Gun

• Walter Dean Myers reading W. E. B. DuBois: Editorial from The Crisis Magazine

• Francine Prose reading Zbiegnew Herbert: "Five Men"

• Salman Rushdie: Introduction & Conclusion

• Monique Truong reading Linda Le: Slander