Responding to an article in the Harvard Crimson, the Stanford Daily confirms that black scholars Lawrence Bobo and Marcyliena Morgan, who are husband and wife, have been offered tenured slots at Harvard—just a few years after Morgan was rejected for tenure by Lawrence Summers. From the sound of it, Bobo and Morgan are going to get some serious raises wherever they go.

According to Stanford dean of the humanities and sciences Richard Saller,

“Both of them play a really vital role in the intellectual community here,” he said. “They are leaders and we will be extremely aggressive in convincing them to stay.”

I'm intrigued by the comments appended to the article, which basically say, "Wait a minute—they just got here!"

You can't blame a working couple for taking the best offer they get, of course. We've all only got one life to live. But jumping back and forth like this does represent a loss to the academic community; how can intellectual hopscotchers possibly contribute to the institution where they work in a meaningful, long-term way ? How, for example, could they help craft a new curriculum? And what happens to the institutional memory that is so important to the operation of a place like Harvard if a growing percentage of its faculty comes and goes every few years? Does it become more rooted in the quiet, secretive bureaucrats—the vice-presidents of this and that—who don't always share the values of the academics?

Individually, such hopscotching is good for scholars. But collectively, doesn't it weaken their position in the university?

Former Harvard hip-hop professor Marcyliena Morgan has been offered tenure by the department of African-American studies, according to today's Crimson. Derek Bok has approved the tenure nomination.

This is a bombshell.

In what was actually one of the gutsier moves of his tenure, Larry Summers denied Morgan tenure in 2004, after which she and her husband, Lawrence Bobo, went off to Stanford.

Here's what I understand about that incident.

Many people on the faculty did not believe that Morgan deserved tenure. Her scholarship was underwhelming, they said. (One book, basically.) I also heard several reports that she was a lousy teacher. But Skip Gates wanted to keep Bobo at Harvard, and this was one way to do it. Moreover, ever since the Cornel West incident, Gates knew that Summers could ill afford to provoke more ire from the black community. Give us this one, he urged Summers.

Summers knew all this, of course, but he could not bring himself to offer tenure to someone about whom there was such disagreement. (A hip-hop archive? Worthy, yes. Reason for tenure? Eh...)

(Morgan has also started such an archive at Stanford.)

And so Summers tried to find some other way to keep Morgan (and therefore Bobo) at Harvard. But the two had an offer from Stanford. "I feel the call home to California," Bobo told the Crimson. Stanford made Morgan an "associate professor of communication." Which tells you something right there. On the other hand, it was a tenured position.

Now, here's where the story takes a twist.

As I report in the forthcoming issue of 02138, Summers told people that he rejected Morgan's tenure nomination in part on the advice of Drew Faust. When Faust heard that Summers was invoking her name in the matter, she was not pleased, believing that she had never said any such thing.

So she quickly moved to correct the record. Nonetheless, the incident caused frosty relations between her and the Af-Am department for some time, until Gates and she smoothed things over.

Now there is another moment of racial sensitivity at Harvard: the "Quad Incident." And boom, back comes Morgan's tenure nomination, brilliantly timed to land near the end of Bok's tenure.

It is extremely rare for a professor to be twice proposed for tenure at Harvard, and to be granted tenure after once being rejected.

So far as I can tell, Morgan has not published anything major since she left Harvard. In the spring of this year, she taught "Hip-Hop and Don't Stop: Introduction to Modern Speech Communities," a course focusing on women in hip-hop.

Her tenure case would appear to be no different, on the merits, than the last time around.

What's changed then? Well, no Summers, of course. And how likely is it that Derek Bok, who doesn't handle confrontation well, and is extremely sensitive about his reputation, will reject the tenure nomination of a black woman just as he's on his way out the door?

That's the last thing he wants just as he's wrapping up his interim presidency: a controversy over the rejection of an African-American scholar...even as the Harvard police are asking black students to show their IDs.

Bok may also be falling on his sword here, dealing with this tenure case so that Drew Faust doesn't have to face such a hot button issue right out of the gate.

Sometimes, it's hard to watch the sausage get made, isn't it?

Regular readers of this blog will know that I've often wondered why only a handful of Harvard professors write blogs—what is it about the culture of Harvard that makes people afraid to democratize education and make themselves accessible?

Now the Wall Street Journal reports that Yale, Stanford and MIT are all taking big steps in putting course material online.

Yale University, meanwhile, has announced it will produce digital videos of undergraduate lecture classes and make them available free to the public. This academic year, it is taping seven classes -- from Introduction to the Old Testament to Fundamentals of Physics -- to be posted online this fall.

Harvard is entirely absent from the article.

Could Harvard's mercenary culture be one reason why the university has been so slow to experiment with online education?

Here's a little test. Go to iTunes and search for "Yale" under Podcasts. Then search for Harvard. You'll notice one big difference. (Hint: It involves dollar signs.)

On Gadfly, Adam Goldenberg suggests that, with Jeremy Bloxham having turned down the FAS deanship, Drew Faust is going to have a very difficult time finding a replacement. I agree—though not for all the reasons Goldenberg states. They are:

• • Deal with Harvard’s faculty. Every single day. Forever.
  • Deal with FAS’ budget deficit. More than $75 million in the hole, at last count!
  • Deal with someone else’s Curricular Review. Explain how the new curriculum is not the Core, redux. (It is.)
  • Give up one’s academic vocation and instead become an administrator.

I don't think 1, 2, and 4 are such a big deal. The FAS deanship is still a prestigious and desirable job, especially for professors who might want to become college presidents. You also get a big raise. And let's face it, leaving scholarship behind for a while isn't always the worst thing.

Finally, I'm inclined to think that the FAS deanship under Drew Faust is going to be a strong position. She needs strong deans, and she's smart and secure enough to realize that.

No, the problem seems to me to be #2—budget issues. What if the new dean is going to have to operate in a time of shrinking resources? Trying to manage the relationship between science and Allston at a time when FAS is facing budget cuts could be a nightmare.

It's a lot more fun to be dean when you can say yes than when you're constantly telling people no.

I suspect that this is the real issue here, and it is a big problem for Drew Faust. She obviously wanted a scientist for the deanship. But will any scientist take the job if he or she has to pick and choose among the various science factions because of budget cuts?

As blogger Adam Goldenberg reported last week, Jeremy Bloxham has turned down the FAS deanship. (The Crimson reports the news today.)

With Bloxham out, two of the most serious contenders appear to be Sociology Department Chair Robert J. Sampson and Psychology Department Chair Stephen M. Kosslyn, though other professors could still be candidates, the two individuals close to University administrators said.

Well! This is Drew Faust's first bump in the road, and it is a large one. She now has to hurry to appoint a second choice before the end of the school year, because the dean should be appointed by the end of the school year. (It's already taken an awkwardly long time.)

Here's a question: How you can not know that someone will say no if you offer them a job....isn't that what due diligence is for? And yet, the Corporatio gets turned down by Thomas Cech, and Drew Faust gets ixnayed by Bloxham.

Of course, as readers of 02138 will soon find out, there are all sorts of poetic justices in this episode....

The NY Sun runs an AP story on Larry Summers' severance....

"It is comparable for the marketplace," said Claire Van Ummersen, 70, vice president of the American Council on Education's Center for Effective Leadership in Washington. "It is also a reflection on how competitive the presidential marketplace is at the current time."

Am I missing something, or is that quote completely nonsensical? There's a marketplace in golden parachutes? How can a severance package possibly reflect how "competitive the presidential marketplace" is?

There's a point that a poster mentioned a few days ago that I haven't seen raised in a single story about Summers' severance: His five-year contract was up. Harvard didn't have to pay him a thing. Why did it? To buy his silence....

Again, perhaps I'm missing something, but what is the point of even having a five-year contract if its expiration is meaningless?

Harvard's faculty voted on and passed a new curriculum yesterday, thus demonstrating that the faculty is not wholly ungovernable and counterproductive. So how come nobody sounds very excited about it?

English prof Jim Engell calls it "an imperfect document." Harry Lewis says that "we have simply missed the opportunity to do the right thing." Bill Kirby, always good for a China joke, said, "“The motion was passed unanimously although many comrades were opposed.”

I haven't thought as much about this as the people involved, but it still seems to me that there's no intellectual theory to this reform other than saying, well, people should take courses in a few important areas, and it'd be swell if they connected to the real world.

The first strikes me as obvious, the second mundane. Is this really the most we can expect from the world's finest university?

The Boston Herald runs an Associated Press piece on Drew Faust and "the delicate balance of inspiration, ego-boosting and cocktail-party cajoling it takes to get Harvard’s 11 colleges and institutes and its 24,000 employees on the same page."

Faust apparently cooperated with the piece, which is odd, because she has turned down requests from Harvard Magazine and 02138, two outlets with Harvard constituencies, but now speaks to a wire service reporter.

"You have to [lead] in somewhat indirect ways because you have to bring everyone along with you," Faust said in a recent interview with The Associated Press, contemplating the "peculiar nature" of colleges.

"That challenge of movement and collaboration and to keep those things together is, I think, at the heart of every university presidency."

There's not much news in the piece other than the revelation that Faust "plans to start a major program to improve theater and visual arts on campus."

In fact, it doesn't sound like the reporter got a lot of time with Faust; Steve Hyman is quoted more than she is. One wonders if that is reflective of anything.

In The New Republic, Alan Dershowitz explains his "feud" with Norman Finkelstein.

Suddenly I'm the Nazi? And a masturbating one to boot! I'm not shy about entering arguments, but I can't help feeling like I walked into a trap. How could I not argue against Finkelstein? But, when I raise my voice, I know that I'm supplying essential ammunition. I guess when you've got no scholarship to make your tenure case, you need all the outside interference you can get.

With two such contentious people, one is tempted to wish a pox on both their houses, or just sit back and watch the mud fly. But such an abdication of judgment is probably unfair to Dershowitz. He actually sounds pretty reasonable here.

On the other hand, some of the commenters aren't buying it....

The blog will be a little light today, as I have other pressing matters: namely, my 25th high school reunion.

I know, I can't believe it either.

So, quickly.

The Globe reports that the K-School 4 won't face any criminal charges for shouting down FBI director Robert Mueller. (I wonder if they're disappointed?) Apparently Harvard's nameless, late-night plea worked; if Harvard won't press charges, the cops won't either.

Here's a little pop quiz for you: Without doing any research, can you name any of the causes the K-School 4 were screaming about?

In the Crimson, two smart guys tell the RIAA where it can go. Bravo! That's the spirit.

If Harvard decides to renovate its dorms—which are in serious need of that—it will need to build a provisional dorm to house exiled students. As Yale's experience shows, there could be some unintended consequences: more people living on campus.

By the way...would that require still more fundraising by Drew Faust?

School of Public Health dean Barry Bloom is actually making headway trying to convince Hollywood that smoking in films should affect their ratings. Interesting. Not sure how I feel about this...does anyone smoke in a G-rated movie, anyway?

Have a great weekend, everyone.

Sometimes the New York Times really is pathetic.

In late January, a committee on teaching led by Theda Skocpol issued a report recommending ways to improve teaching at Harvard.

Today, the Times runs a story on it.

Yes, that's right, folks: almost four months after the report is released, the paper of record breaks the news.

Does it actually mention the date of the report's release? Of course not. You can't very well suggest that something is important but simultaneously acknowledge that you're four months late in reporting it.

Here's how the Times fudges that embarrassing little fact; I've bolded the key words.

Headed by Theda Skocpol, a social scientist, the group has issued a report calling for sweeping institutional change....

And that's it—no date, no nothing.

But because of Harvard’s standing, its effort is being closely watched around the country.

Apparently not that closely watched, or it wouldn't have taken the Times (would it?) four months to get around to saying something about it.

One of the hilarious things about this story is that it pays all sorts of attention to Harvard's attempts to emphasize teaching...but barely acknowledges the fact that Yale and Princeton are renowned for their commitment to teaching, so really all that Harvard is doing is playing catch-up.

Which is not to say that it isn't a laudable goal; it is. But still....it's a little silly to suggest that Harvard's new commitment to teaching is influential and everyone is paying attention to it when lots of other places already teach very well, thank you.

"It’s well known that there are many other colleges where students are much more satisfied with their academic experience,” said Paul Buttenwieser, a psychiatrist and author who is a member of the Harvard Board of Overseers, and who favors the report. “Amherst is always pointed to. Harvard should be as great at teaching as Amherst.”

I have a couple of reactions to this.

First, I think quite a few people who are paying tens of thousands of dollars a year to send their kid to Harvard will be disturbed to read the sentence, "Harvard should be as great at teaching as Amherst."

But Buttenwieser is actually quite savvy to use that college as his example, because Amherst and Harvard are apples and oranges; Harvard really doesn't compete with Amherst.

Imagine, though, if Buttenwieser had compared apples and apples.

Harvard should be as great at teaching as Yale and Princeton.

Now, that sentence would be much more troubling, wouldn't it?

Yesterday we talked about whether women who have kids are forced off the tenure track, or choose to step off it, or some combination of both.

In today's Times, Selena Roberts writes about the decision of tennis player Kim Clijsters to retire at age 23.

Clijsters explained her reasons on her website.

(Tennis players blog! Curt Schilling blogs! Harvard profs...don't!)

Quitting tennis at an age of nearly 24 is pretty young still. I could have easily gone on and still reel in the four major big earners (three Grand Slams and the Masters). Money is important, but not the most important in my life. Health and happiness are so much more key to life.

...it is time for a new life. Time for marrying. Children? Time for cooking and playing with the dogs.

Systemic discrimination?

Roberts certainly doesn't think so. She suggests that the only thing wrong with this situation is that not every woman can afford to do it.

...what women’s tennis may reveal is the same socially sanctioned element that ribbons through every Starbucks, where mommies with M.B.A.’s prefer to run play dates instead of boardroom meetings. In this circle, it’s O.K. to jump off the fast track for the mommy track or laugh track. Whatever makes a woman of means happy.

Let's just repeat that line, shall we?

...mommies with M.B.A.’s prefer to run play dates instead of boardroom meetings....

In Manhattan, I see women like this all the time—women who can afford to jump out of the rat race because of their husbands' earning power, and happily, happily do. Some of them have even gone to Harvard. I suspect there are many women whose husbands aren't rich who choose to do the same, either to be with their kids more or just because they're tired of working.

It's a choice that men really don't have.....

In Ms. magazine—yup, it's still here— Caryn McTighe Musil says that the choice of Drew Faust as Harvard president is good progress for women, but it's not enough.

Feminists celebrated Faust’s selection for many reasons, including her distinguished feminist scholarship and the fact she was once a director of women’s studies. But while her appointment is historic and symbolically important, it should not mask the reality of life for women in higher education.

...women continue to advance more slowly up faculty ranks and earn less salary than their male colleagues. Even though more women are tenured today, the tenure gender gap has not narrowed in the last 25 years. Furthermore, despite high-profile appointees such as Faust, women are still disproportionately represented in lower ranks and at less prestigious institutions.

Musil goes on to discuss the problem of the "Baby Gap," an oft-discussed issue regarding women in academia.

...having children, especially “early babies,” is a disadvantage for women’s professional careers—but an advantage for men’s. Women with babies are 29 percent less likely than women without to enter a tenure- track position, and married women are 20 percent less likely than single women to do so.

This argument always strikes me as unconvincing. For one thing, it is profoundly sexist. It assumes that all women who have children want to be on tenure track jobs, when of course that's not true. Every couple with children has to negotiate some sort of balance between child rearing and work, and while some women may go the full-time nanny/day-care route, many don't, and there's nothing wrong with that. Frankly, having a non-tenure track academic job sounds like a great way to balance work and family whether you're a woman or a man.

But this argument in Ms. totally devalues women's choices by assuming that there is only one legitimate choice for women—to be as professionally successful as possible. If you are not as professionally successful as you could be, it must be because the system discriminates against you.

Musil continues:

Women with “early” babies leave academia more frequently before getting their first tenure-track job, but women with “late” babies do as well as women without children. Given that systemic bias against motherhood....

Well, that's just bad social science, or at least bad interpretation of data. There are lots of reasons why women with "early" babies leave academia more frequently before getting their first tenure-track job—such as, maybe they weren't so sure they wanted to be academics. Or, maybe after they had their kids they reconsidered the balance of work versus motherhood in their lives.

The only systemic bias against motherhood that's on display here is the one shown by Ms. magazine.....

The Princetonian reports that Drew Faust is on Time's list of the 100 most influential people in the world, a list in which "Princeton connections are scattered throughout."

But of course Faust did not go to Princeton. So why is she on the list?

Faust comes from a long line of Princetonians, including former University presidents Jonathan Edwards and Aaron Burr. When Faust was applying to colleges in the 1960s, the University did not accept female students.

That's pretty bad writing, because I can't tell if Faust's line of former Princetonians includes Jonathan Edwards and Aaron Burr, or if Jonathan Edwards and Aaron Burr are simply two former Princetonians.

But I think the suggestion is that if Princeton had accepted women in the 1960s, then Faust would have gone there.... (Her father went to Princeton.) Interesting to think how things might have turned out differently if Faust hadn't gone to Bryn Mawr.

Here's what else the Princetonian has to say:

Recently tapped as the first female president of Harvard, she will succeed Lawrence Summers, who stepped down following a firestorm of controversy for comments in early 2005, in which he suggested that the dearth of women in the sciences might be due to "innate differences" between the genders.

Note the ubiquitous causality here: Summers makes offensive comments, boom, he resigns. Of course, we all know it didn't really happen that way.....

Today's Crimson editorializes in favor of the four protesters who shouted down FBI director Robert Mueller and were arrested at a Kennedy School event.

The Harvard University Police Department’s (HUPD) response to a group of unruly protesters at last week’s speech by Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Robert S. Mueller III demonstrated blatant disregard for established rules, past procedure, and—most importantly—common sense.

I respect the Crimson's passion, but it's wrong: The paper claims that it is arguing on behalf of free speech, when in fact it's arguing for the right to curtail free speech.

The whole thing lasted under two minutes, and the protesters planned on leaving quietly as soon as they were warned to do so by police. Instead the protesters were forcibly ejected, arrested, and charged criminally with disturbing a public assembly without ever receiving a warning.

This is an argument that has floated around since the arrest happened. We would have stopped if you'd just asked us nicely.

This is, of course, an easy assertion to make after the fact. But there's as good a chance that it's not true as there's a chance that it is. The clear intention of the protest was to disrupt the event; had the protesters not been asked to leave, who's to say they wouldn't have continued their disruption indefinitely? One suspects they would have been delighted to have had the opportunity.

Here's another sentence I find puzzling.

In an academic community founded on the bedrock principle of the unfettered exchange of ideas, the threat of unwarned arrest would no doubt have a chilling effect on the quality of debate and discussion that goes on at Harvard.

The unfettered exchange of ideas? That is, of course, exactly what the protesters were trying to obstruct. Mueller was starting to give a speech; they shouted him down. That is not the unfettered exchange of ideas.

Now, the Crimson points out that the students were supposed to be warned. (An astute poster on the Crimson site points out that the regulations in question are those of the FAS, and the event was held at the Kennedy School, which is not a part of the FAS.)

HUPD acted in flagrant violation of cut-and-dry standing regulations....

But as I've suggested here, those regulations aren't cut-and-dried at all. In fact, they never stipulate that a warning must be issued before an arrest, they only discuss the beneficial effects achieved by the issuance of such a warning.

The protesters should also not face sanctions from the Administrative Board of Harvard College. They have already been put through a trying ordeal thanks to University mistakes.

A trying ordeal? A trying ordeal, Harvard alums will recall, is sitting in University Hall when police shoot tear gas through the windows, then beat the shit out of you with nightsticks. A few hours in the HUPD is not a trying ordeal, and if it is, then maybe you should get out of the protest business.

The Crimson is right that HUPD erred badly in its police report, and that should be a subject of further inquiry. On most everything else, though, this editorial is wrong.

Harvard seems to have an excess of presidents right now, even as it's going through something of a power vacuum. It's an odd situation. FAS dean Jeremy Knowles has stepped down; one president is outgoing; one president is incoming; one president is returning.

Yesterday, Drew Faust and four other female presidents of Ivy League universities gathered to talk about women and leadership.

At the same time, Derek Bok e-mailed the entire campus to start a discussion on calendar reform, suggesting that he has no intention of acting like a lame duck.

Meanwhile, stealing the thunder of both Bok and Faust, Larry Summers spoke yesterday at the final class of "Morality and Taboo," a course taught by Summers supporters Steve Pinker and Alan Dershowitz, on the subject of his women-in-science speech.

Summers made a joke about not being able to imagine why he was invited to a class on morality and taboo, then ate some crow.

All kinds of girls all over the world were reading that the president of Harvard believes that they can’t do math,” Summers recalled yesterday. He said that his position at the University’s helm should have kept him from acting as an “intellectual provocateur.”

Then Summers actually took another shot at explaining the paucity of women in science and math.

In a brief aside, Summers compared girls and boys who earn a perfect score on their math SATs. The girls, he said, are more likely to score higher on the verbal portion of the test. Summers then asked rhetorically whether it should be “shocking or disturbing” that those girls choose to enter fields broader than math, given their “superior verbal abilities.”

I suppose the man deserves credit for venturing back into what are, for him, such dangerous waters. But to my mind, this is a little bit like Mitt Romney saying he disapproves of Scientology. Why even raise the issue?

Summers also took a shot at the faculty in discussing the reasons for his ouster.

“Some of it undoubtedly had to do with the issues we’re discussing,” he said, “but part of it also had to do with my conviction to push the faculty into places that they were less willing to go.”

It would be interesting for some interviewer to follow up and ask Summers specifically what places he is referring to. He has made this claim several times, but never, I don't think, in a forum where there's an opportunity for a follow-up question. (Or if he has, no one's ever asked it.)

As long as Summers makes this claim vaguely, he gets away with it. But the second he offers specifics, people are going to call him on them.

The Crimson reports today that the University supports the dropping of criminal charges against the four protesters who disrupted a speech by FBI director Robert Mueller at the Kennedy School.

“The University is persuaded that more could have been done in the circumstances to apprise the students that they were in jeopardy of arrest,” said a statement released by Harvard last night. “Without condoning the students’ behavior at the Forum, broader principles have led the University to request that the criminal charges against the students be dropped.”

Isn't that a bit like asking the police to read a suspected criminal his Miranda rights before making the arrest?

Apparently because the statement was released late at night—an attempt to bury it, I suppose—the story is short on important details, such as:

Who at Harvard released this statement? Mass Hall? College dean Dick Gross?

What, exactly, are the broader principles involved? The right to shout down an invited speaker?

For, if you watch the video of the event, you can see that that is exactly what occurs.

It will be interesting to see the full text of this statement from the University, but my instinct is that Harvard is making a mistake here.

The students involved are facing a month in jail or a $50 fine. Good. Let them face the legal consequences of their intrusion. Otherwise, how can protest have any seriousness?

I'm sure the protesters are well-meaning. But they seem to have an inflated opinion of themselves and a superficial understanding of the nature of their actions.

“We are looking forward to getting back to our lives,” [protester Michael] Gould-Wartofsky said.

No. After spending some time in the Birmingham jail, Martin Luther King was looking forward to getting back to his life. After 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela was looking forward to getting back to his life. After a few hours in the Harvard University Police Department, you do not get to say that you are looking forward to getting back to your life.

Here's what one protester, J. Claire Provost, concluded: “In a way it was good to have such an issue made out of this case so that it highlights the issue that we were trying to highlight through our protest—the issue of suppression of civil liberties and the importance of free speech."

Provost says that she and her colleagues are protesting on behalf of free speech...by repeatedly shouting down a speaker in a public forum. If she is aware of the irony, she gives no sign.

“We hope that this will be the last prosecution of peaceful protesters that ever happens on Harvard’s campus,” Gould-Wartofsky said.

But shouting down a speaker is not a peaceful act; it is a violent one. It is aggressive, threatening, unnerving, disturbing, disruptive, and upsetting. And this is precisely why these students chose that route—because they thought that such a disruptive action would be more effective than, say, carrying picket signs outside the school.

Yes, shouting down a public speaker on private property is a form of protest. Just not a protected one.

It will be interesting to hear on what grounds Harvard University defends the violation of free speech.

I took a little break from the computer last night to attend the annual PEN black-tie bash, held this year at the Museum of Natural History.

The PEN American Center, if you don't know, is a literary organization that fights for freedom of the press around the world and, increasingly in recent years, here in the United States. Its director, Michael Roberts, used to work at Harvard under Neil Rudenstine.

I was the guest of Joan Khoury and the Bank of New York, who, I'm delighted to announce, will be advertising in the next issue of 02138.

Some thoughts on the evening.

It's easy to be cynical about these affairs—wealthy New Yorkers getting all dressed up to schmooze—but there is something inspiring and fundamentally serious about the PEN dinner. The evening paid tribute to the four Connecticut librarians who refused to comply with a Patriot Act request for information on the Internet searches of its patrons—that's my home state! Small, but feisty—and to a Cuban journalist, Normando Hernandez Gonzalez, who is dying in prison. His mother came to accept an award for him, and gave a short but moving speech in Spanish. After the black tie is hung up until next year, these are the memories that linger and matter.

That said, the PEN dinner is also really terrific for people-watching, partly because it's a bit of a challenge: Literary celebrities are only semi-famous, and you often look at them and think, I know I know who that is, but I can't quite remember...

Here are some tidbits.

Salman Rushdie was on hand with his wife, the model/writer/chef Padma Lakshi, who is so beautiful, it's difficult not to simply stand and gawp. She is quite tall, with flowing black hair, flawless skin, and hypnotic eyes. She was wearing a faux-fur wrap and a lime green dress with a long, sloping cut down the back, exposing an arc of her skin from her top right shoulder to her left hip. I can tell you this because she had a long conversation right in front of me—I swear, this was not intentional on my part—and it was logistically impossible not to look. She also seems like a nice person.

Salman Rushdie, on the other hand, looks kind of surly. The tabs have these two on the outs, and for a few minutes, he looked irritated as more people seemed interested in talking to his wife than to him. He kept trying to catch her eye in that, "Okay, honey, can we go now?" look that all husbands and wives are familiar with. But then a couple of fans came up to him, and he was happy again.

PEN and Borders bookstore gave an award to Gore Vidal, I have no idea what for, but bully for them; as speaker Tina Brown pointed out, the dinner this year was without Kurt Vonnegut, David Halberstam, and Arthur Schesinger, Jr., which is a heavy-hitting threesome. Gore Vidal is a pain in the ass, but he is brilliant and unique and we should celebrate that while he's still alive.

Vidal didn't look well. He could not stand to receive the award, and his body looked shrunken. His mind, however, is as acerbic and contrarian as ever. He made a little joke about entering the museum and seeing old friends—"the dinosaurs"—and then thanked Tina Brown, whom he called the best editor of The New Yorker, despite the fact that David Remnick was hosting a table not far from him. Then he railed against the Bush administration, which went over better than his claim that Tina Brown was a better New Yorker editor than David Remnick.

I spoke briefly with Alex Kuczynski, author of Beauty Junkies, a book about plastic surgery. She was there with her husband and mother, who was very sweet. "Ever since that book came out," she whispered to me, "people keep looking at my face." To quote a great man, charming as hell.

Tim Russert was the MC of the night, which was a little depressing—even at a literary dinner, TV people are the real stars—but then, he has been embroiled in some freedom of the press fights recently. Russert was wearing make-up. He began his speech with two Yogi Berra jokes, which felt like two jokes he has delivered about 100,000 times.

I talked to the brilliant Peter Carey, who would not tell me about the new novel he is writing. I also talked with Jennet Conant, who also would not tell me about the new book she is writing. (Her last book, you will remember, was largely about her grandfather, former Harvard president James B. Conant.) "It's something about World War II and spies," she said. "But then, that's what all my books are about."

Gay Talese looked dapper as usual, in black suede lace-ups, a tux, and a black fedora.

Calvin Trillin was the guest of honor at my table, and he is just delightful—warm and funny and unpretentious. He spoke of his grandchildren with a quiet love. On taking them shopping, he said, he found himself saying something he'd never before said: "Don't you have anything more expensive than that?"

The moment was particularly poignant because Trillin's wife, Alice, passed away (of natural causes) on September 11, 2001, and grandchildren really matter under such circumstances.

I saw Jay McInerney wandering around, looking slightly pissed, in a Salman Rushdie sort of way, that no one wanted to talk to him. Then he saw a woman he knew. Much better.

Writers have a challenge these days, and that is to claim their relevance in a culture where television and the Internet have usurped the prominence of writing. The silver lining is that, in hard times like the ones we currently find ourselves in, writers do matter; they are important.

(I bumped into New Yorker editor Henry Finder—former editor of the Harvard-based magazine, Transition—and had the chance to tell him what a powerful, and important piece of journalism I thought George Packer's recent article about the fate of Iraqis who risked everything to work for the United States—and how the White House is abandoning them to be slaughtered.)

Whether in the United States or abroad, more and more writers are rising to the challenge of writing in an age when freedom is under siege. Let's hope it makes a difference; I have to believe it will.