Eavesdropping on Markus Zusak and Susan Campbell Bartoletti

PEN American Center is currently featuring Part I of an email conversation between two authors who write for children and young adults: Markus Zusak, an Australian, and Susan Campbell Bartoletti, an American. Both have recent books about the Second World War and the Holocaust: Zusak's novel The Book Thief and Bartoletti's Hitler Youth (nonfiction) and The Boy Who Dared (fiction). In his first correspondence with Bartoletti, Zusak confesses he hasn't read Hitler Youth. Not exactly an auspicious beginning, but the discussion improves from there. Click here to read it.

As its web site indicates, PEN American Center "works to advance literature, to defend free expression, and to foster international literary fellowship."

Comments

[Vivian]

Thanks for sharing this e-mail discussion.

[Susan T.]

You're welcome, Vivian. I think PEN does some great stuff.