Yes, the lineup for the sixth annual PEN World Voices festival of international literature has just been announced, and it’s sexy. Sexy in the way that librarian hair and geek glasses are sexy. The folk from PEN were at the Instituto Cervantes in midtown earlier today, plying the assembled crowd with Spanish wine and empanadas, and talking about the literary treats that await New Yorkers when the whole shebang kicks off on April 26.

Festival participants include such literati as Salman Rushdie (who’s also the festival’s chair), Richard Ford, Sebastian Junger, Adam Gopnik, Roddy Doyle, Colm Tóibín, Ben Okri, Mohsin Hamid, A.M. Homes, Sherman Alexie and Nobel Prize winner Toni Morrison. Patti Smith and Brooklyn’s own Jonathan Lethem will be in the same room at the same time, talking to each other, and you can watch. Natalie Merchant will sing snippets from her latest album at the fourth annual PEN Cabaret.

All told, more than 150 authors, translators, editors and performers will add their voices to the throng, coming to the city from Europe, Chile, Russia, the Middle East, India, the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, Nigeria, China, Mexico and, of course, the rest of the U.S. Many of the events are free, while some are ticketed. Tickets have a habit of selling out, so consider yourself warned: Get your order in now.

Pen World Voices Festival of International Literature, various venues, Apr 26 - May 2, 2010. See www.pen.org/festival for details.

Gaitskill’s  2009 story collection, Don’t Cry, evokes raw emotional states with beautiful linguistic control, and glimpses the chaos that lies just beyond everyday human behavior. For her, even a serial killer’s crimes are part of a rational grid; her stories aim for states that aren’t subject to control, like joy and vulnerability and terror. The tensions in her intensely crafted work make her a great writer, but tonight, she’ll offer her unique point of view on another activity: reading. Why do we do it? To be entertained, sure. But expect Gaitskill to dig much deeper than that.

Once an obscure poet, Rae Armantrout is now reaching a larger audience (often in the pages of The New Yorker) with her elliptical, oblique narratives. And that audience is about to get bigger. Last week, she won the National Book Critics Circle Award for poetry. You can catch her in the flesh tonight, as she reads from her powerful and playful work.

Your perfect Sunday is feeling frisky, and an unlimited champagne brunch at Parpadou is fueling the fire. After that, “Curious George Saves the Day” will open your eyes to the fascinating story behind the creation of one of our favorite mischievous monkeys. Or maybe you prefer furry friends who can’t pick the lock to your apartment—if so, head to the Brooklyn Mutt Show, which turns the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show on its head with prizes for classes like Looks Most Like Owner, Cutest Puppy and Sloppiest Kisser. Your perfect Sunday is puckered up and ready for action. Are you?

A world where Sam Lipsyte is a respected novelist can’t be all bad. His new novel, The Ask, seems to have it all: brutal humor, intelligence, an awe-inspiring style. But the book goes far beyond its shiny individual accomplishments: Lipsyte, a prankster with an old soul, gets at something dark and deep about how we live, think and work. He’s easily one of the best writers working today, and you can see him read tonight. In addition to making you laugh, he might scare you. But you’ll probably be the better for it.

David Shields, the author of Reality Hunger, dropped this bomb in a recent interview with Bookslut: “I swear to God, I can’t read a book unless it has miniature numbered sections. I exaggerate, but only slightly.” Those are fighting words, especially if you enjoy reading Tolstoy. But while it’s easy to be skeptical of Shields’s new book (subtitled A Manifesto), we do appreciate the books the author does like to read: Joe Wenderoth, Renata Adler and Marcel Proust (no short chapters there), among others. And while it’s questionable that the book is fiery enough to achieve “manifesto” status, it does a good job shaking up current literary models, all the while calling for new genres of writing. Shields appears tonight in a series called “True to Life,” and anyone who’s familiar with his approach to memoirs (truth springs from a writer’s belief in what he or she is writing, not from facts themselves) will know that this discussion will be lively, particularly if/when it moves to the subject of James Frey. Anyone who thinks contemporary writing needs to evolve in some way should go. Editor and author Matt Weiland moderates.

Author Barry Hannah is dead. Though he was classified as a Southern writer, his books—particularly the short-fiction collection Airships and the novella Ray—cast a wide and impressively diverse influence: Admirers include experimental fiction writer Ben Marcus, Adderall Diaries author Stephen Elliott and…Stephen Malkmus.

Whitney, baby, one more time
1. 2010 Whitney Biennial
If you’ve got the energy to elbow your way through the crowds, head to the Upper East Side for opening weekend of the showcase of contemporary American art at the Whitney Museum of Modern Art (945 Madison Ave at 75th St; 212-570-3600, whitney.org). If you’re lucky, the slush-covered streets will keep some of the culture vultures at bay. Afterward, hit up Mexican-wrestling–themed Cascabel Taqueria (1542 Second Ave between 80th and 81st Sts; 212-717-7800, nyctacos.com) for its new brunch offerings, which include a Tostada Bar and a free mug of homemade spiced hot chocolate.

Read more: TONY’s review

Hit the jump for more weekend itineraries

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When we saw Ed Park read last Saturday, he cracked us up, sharing a new, technology-infused story narrated by a man disgruntled with his girlfriend (a reviewer of übergeeky sci-fi and a grad student who studies “robot literature”) and his parents (who are selling all of his stuff on eBay). We’re not sure he’ll read the same thing tonight at an event organized by Bookforum, but it’s a safe bet that he’ll present something imaginative, idiosyncratic and deeply funny. Adding gravitas to the evening will be Mary Gaitskill—whose brave, chaotic and beautiful Don’t Cry was a 2009 TONY favorite—and Hari Kunzru, author of My Revolutions.

Writer and academic André Aciman had to field some pretty weighty questions last night: “What’s the meaning of literature, and has it changed over time?” was NYPL president Paul Leclerc’s opener, which was greeted with laughter from Aciman. “I’m not going to touch on that” he said, before talking about the things that stay, in a literary sense at least, omnipresent: love and war. His latest book, Eight White Nights, is firmly in the former camp: it’s the story of a couple whose love life plays out over one week on the Upper West Side.

Aciman addressed some of the journalistic criticism leveled at his latest novel, in particular the notion that his characters seem to inhabit a world apart from quotidian concerns: “Reviewers get very annoyed when you don’t give a profession [for a character]. ‘What does he do for a living?’ It’s immaterial.” For Aciman, it’s the internal world that matters.

He spoke, finally, of the universality of feeling that his novel explores: “We’ve all been there when the person you’re dying to call tells you not to call, and you now have eight hours to wait for that moment when you will see if you are going to be alive that evening or not.” Roland Barthes said something similar in A Lover’s Discourse: as in love and war, it seems, some things never change.

At this point, The Paris Review is probably best known for its in-depth author interviews (many of which are available here). Tonight, you can watch one take place in real time, as former PR editor and nonfiction writer Philip Gourevitch holds court with poet and memoirist Mary Karr onstage at Joe’s Pub. Judging from the speedy dialogue and comic descriptiveness of Karr’s books The Liars’ Club and Lit, you can count on this conversation to be not just literary but also witty and opinionated.

A few weeks ago, Katie Roiphe argued in The New York Times Book Review that young American male authors don’t write about sex as much (or as well) as they did in the days of Mailer-Updike. Someone should send her Kevin Sampsell’s memoir, A Common Pornography, and Justin Taylor’s Everything Here Is the Best Thing Ever, two new books that confront sex with openness and refreshing honesty. They have a few other things in common: Both are big-hearted, brave, imaginative and stylish. Both offer unique and resonant portraits of what it’s like to be a young artist today. And tonight, both are reading at Word Bookstore.

Patricia Highsmith was one of the 20th century’s great thriller writers. Probably best known as the creator of shape-shifting sociopath Tom Ripley, she wrote many books full of existential angst, evil and perverse imagination, including the deranged wife-killer tale Strangers on a Train (later adapted by Hitchcock). Her books are fun to read (our favorite is The Tremor of Forgery, in which a writer throws his typewriter at someone in the middle of the night, and spends the rest of the book wondering if he’s committed murder), but her life turns out to be fascinating, too, as Joan Schenkar has revealed in her new biography, The Talented Miss Highsmith, which captures the author’s love life (tumultuous) and creative growth. Bonus: Schenkar’s book provides a detailed list of Highsmith’s New York City haunts, which included the piano bar Marie’s Crisis.

Anya Hindmarch Pop-up Tattoo Parlor
Indulge your inner teenage rebel with a sultry temporary tattoo at the posh British designer’s Soho store. An expert artist will be on hand to ink you with free tats on a first-come, first-served basis. Whimsical designs include pierced red hearts that read “Anya Ink,” nautical mermaids and anchors, and  “I HEART Bags” logos for gals seriously devoted to their accessories. You can show off your ink with a Polaroid snapshot, to be taken and displayed at the store for other body-art connoisseurs. Hindmarch’s latest collection will be available for swooning over, and last season’s trendy pieces will be offered at 50 percent off. 115 Greene St at Prince St (212-343-8147, anyahindmarch.com). Fri 13–Sat 14 11am–7pm.

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Jonathan Lethem’s latest novel, Chronic City, features a pop-culture critic named Perkus Tooth—a man given to magnificent obsessions with conspiracy theories, music and more. Appropriately, Lethem’s reading tour last fall found him engaging in an obsessive task: He set out to read the entire novel at his eight New York City appearances last fall (no small feat when you consider the book’s length: 480 pages). Those readings were great, but this evening’s your chance to catch the author in a more reflective, conversational mode. At 5pm, he’ll discuss his work with fellow novelist Darin Strauss. A good speaker with compellingly craggy ideas about fiction, Lethem should be as entertaining as Tooth himself.

J.D. Salinger, the notoriously reclusive creator of Holden Caulfield, is dead. Though he published his last work in 1965, his sensibility, not to mention his sentence style, has cast an influence that will surely outlast him. His Franny and Zooey, a novel that easily matched his more-popular Catcher in the Rye, served as a touchstone for Wes Anderson’s The Royal Tenenbaums. His novella Seymour: An Introduction has inspired Gary Lutz, one of the more inventive story writers of the moment. Don’t lament for too long, though. To quote Holden Caulfield:

“Boy, when you’re dead, they really fix you up. I hope to hell when I do die somebody has sense enough to just dump me in the river or something. Anything except sticking me in a goddam cemetery. People coming and putting a bunch of flowers on your stomach on Sunday, and all that crap. Who wants flowers when you’re dead?”

To a broad swath of readers and writers Lydia Davis is not just one of our best writers of short fiction, but a hero—a writer who uses superbly crafted sentences to capture disorienting states of being. She is a deeply funny writer, whose slightly obsessive narrators tend to excel at the art of cataloging their own mistakes. She is also deeply philosophical. Her powers of observation turn apparently simple situations—a child’s nap, a stack of get-well cards—into complex predicaments. Tonight she makes a rare appearance and gives her first New York City reading since the publication of the landmark The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis. If you’re interested in this accessible but superbly unique writer whose work explores the possibilities of storytelling in fascinating ways, you shouldn’t miss it.

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Okay, it’s not exactly news at this point, but the publishing industry is in a crisis. Sales are down. Business soothsayers predict that the Kindle and the iPad will soon send publishers into a tailspin. But not everyone is convinced that the book (and the bookstore) is doomed. Dennis Loy Johnson, the publisher of the independent press Melville House, became tired of the current commentary, so he decided to launch a series of discussions himself, titled Publishing in the Age of Blah Blah Blah. The inaugural event welcomes not big-house publishers or e-book innovators but fiction writers themselves. And the lineup is a solid one: Heidi Julavits (The Uses of Enchantment), John Wray (Lowboy), Sarah Manguso (Hard to Admit and Harder to Escape), Myla Goldberg (Bee Season), Tao Lin (Shoplifting from American Apparel) and others. Anyone interested in what the artists have to say about literature’s future should check out this event.

Nick Flynn is a poet turned memoirist whose writing is so strong that he can chart existential free-fall and still land on his feet. Tonight he performs one of his narrative balancing acts at the Strand, where he’ll read from his latest memoir, The Ticking Is the Bomb. A story told in short chapters, the book artfully weaves between reflections on zombie movies, Greek mythology and a tragic family history (his mom committed suicide; his dad is a volatile drunk). All of these story lines become lenses through which Flynn observes crises both personal (his anxieties about becoming a father) and geopolitical (particularly U.S.-sanctioned torture at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere). The tone is at once fragile and grounded, bleak and funny (watch for the chapter titled “Sheepfucker”). Flynn walks into the wilderness—of himself, of modern warfare—and then emerges. He’s too smart to offer up any ultimate truths, but the way he thinks and writes is nothing less than a triumph.

On one Friday night a month, board game enthusiasts convene at Soho’s Think Coffee (248 Mercer St between 3rd and 4th Sts, 212-228-6226, thinkcoffeenyc.com) to do what they love best. And even though the event is organized by Nerd NYC, an active online community of gamers, you don’t have to know the ins and outs of Inca Gold to join the fun.

“There are no rules to the event,” says Think night manager and events coordinator Sarah Riley. “It’s free. Everyone is welcome. You can bring and play whatever you want.” (And if you should show up empty-handed, you can always join in another game.)

That said, Riley warns that the majority of participants “tend to be people who are really into games.” Don’t be surprised if you find your Scrabble game side by side with heated tournaments of Dune, the Settlers of Catan or Magic: The Gathering, but rest assured that no one’s going to harass you for whipping out that old Candy Land set.

Throughout the evening (7–11pm), the café will be offering comfort-food faves like grilled cheese and peanut-butter–banana sandwiches from the kitchen. Yum!

Image via Amazon.com