Author: Kristine Phillips / Source: Washington Post
Pulitzer Prize-winning author Junot Diaz has withdrawn from a writers festival amid allegations that he had forcefully kissed a woman and showed aggressive behavior toward others.
Writer Zinzi Clemmons said the incident happened when she was a 26-year-old graduate student. She had invited Diaz to speak at a workshop, but Diaz “used it as an opportunity to corner and forcibly kiss me,”
Diaz, who won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao,” and his agent, Nicole Aragi, did not respond to emails from The Washington Post requesting comment Saturday. In a statement to the New York Times, he said: “I take responsibility for my past. That is the reason I made the decision to tell the truth of my rape and its damaging aftermath. This conversation is important and must continue. I am listening to and learning from women’s stories in this essential and overdue cultural movement. We must continue to teach all men about consent and boundaries.”
The Sydney Writers’ Festival announced Diaz’s withdrawal from the event, which ends Sunday.
“As for so many in positions of power, the moment to reckon with the consequences of past behaviour has arrived,” the organization said in a statement. “Sydney Writers’ Festival is a platform for the sharing of powerful stories: urgent, necessary and sometimes difficult. Such conversations have never become more timely.”
Diaz is the latest in a long parade of well-known men to be accused of inappropriate sexual behavior. The accusation from Clemmons, who teaches writing at Occidental College in Los Angeles, also comes as the publishing industry reels from allegations against other prominent authors. On Friday, the same day Clemmons went public with her story, the Swedish Academy announced it will not award the Nobel Prize in literature in 2018 following a sexual misconduct scandal.
[Charlie Rose’s misconduct was widespread at CBS and three managers were warned, investigation finds]
Clemmons first confronted Diaz during a live Q&A session Friday at the Sydney Writers’ Festival, where Diaz was a panelist. Clemmons stunned the crowd after she grabbed a microphone, not bothering to introduce herself, and questioned Diaz about the incident six years ago, when she was a graduate student at Columbia University, people who witnessed the exchange told BuzzFeed.
Clemmons also asked Diaz about a recent New Yorker article, in which Diaz revealed he had been raped…
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