Orhan Pamuk give Turkish Pres a lecture

In a beautiful moment, Orhan Pamuk, at the Frankfurt book fair honoring Turkey this year, gave the audience which included Turkish President Gul a piece of his mind. He did not mince words, and said:

“A century of banning and burning books, of throwing writers into prison or killing them or branding them as traitors and sending them into exile, and continuously denigrating them in the press — none of this has enriched Turkish literature, it has only made it poorer.”

So true. He continued about article 301. The President, who spoke next, actually seems to have taken the criticism pretty well. But his canned answer about the progress they've made so far did not address the point that article 301 must come off the books immediately.