Patti Smith to Receive the PEN America Literary Service Award
Smith recently released her memoir Year of the Monkey
Photo by Johnny Louis/Getty
Poet, artist and roker Patti Smith will be honored with The PEN America Literary Service Award at PEN’s annual gala at The American Museum of Natural History in New York on May 19, 2020.
According to Rolling Stone, PEN President and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jennifer Egan (Manhattan Beach, Black Box, A Visit from the Goon Squad) said in a statement, “In all of Patti Smith’s thrilling incarnations—rock goddess, poet, eloquent witness to the bohemian New York of her youth—she has testified to the transformative power of literature in her own life, and used her stardom to encourage reading and writing in the legions who revere her.” Egan added, “A polestar of my own teenage years, she set an example of badass female artistry, coupled with deeply principled humanity, that I’m still trying to live up to.”