Exhibition Inauguration: "Unlocking The History of PEN International"
Please, register now using the link above and join us on Zoom for the first event of PEN International's Centenary year, where we will present "Unlocking the History of PEN International". The digital exhibition showcases for the very first time digitised and digital archives from PEN International and 90 PEN Centres around the world.
EVENT PROGRAMME
Chair: Joanne Leedom-Ackerman, vice-president of PEN International
Opening remarks by Jennifer Clement, president of PEN International. With the participation of Carles Torner, Centenary director, Ginevra Avalle, curator of the Exhibition, and Romana Cacchioli, executive director of PEN International.
Key speakers will present the exhibition highlights:
TRAVELLING THE WORLD THROUGH ARCHIVES
Ismaïla Samba Traoré, president of the Malian Centre
Golok Chakmo and Min Nangze, foreign secretary and member of the standing committee of the Tibetan Writers Abroad Centre
Nadezhda Azhgikhina, director of the Moscow Centre
Elena Poniatowska, member of the Mexican Centre and vice-president of PEN International.
Berivan Dosky, honorary president of the Kurdish Centre
HISTORICAL PEN CASES: KEN SARO-WIWA AND LIU XIAOBO
A conversation between Marian Botsford Fraser, former chair of the Writers in Prison Committee, and Sara Whyatt, former programme director of PEN International.
THE PEN CHARTER
A panel discussion with Jennifer Clement, president of PEN International, Philippe Sands, president of English PEN and Ayad Akhtar, president of PEN America.
Photograph of all the PEN members and associates who attended the 59th PEN International Congress in Hvar/Dubrovnik, 19-24 April 1993. This photograph was taken by Damil Kalogjera. © Croatian PEN Centre .
THE CENTENARY OF PEN INTERNATIONAL
This year PEN International celebrates its Centenary. PEN was founded in London in 1921 by Catharine Amy Dawson Scott and is now recognised as the world’s foremost association of writers and a leading international organisation on literature and freedom of expression
Joanne Leedom-Ackerman, then chair of the Writers in Prison Committee of PEN International at a protest rally held at Istanbul University on 11 March 1997, during the first Gathering in Istanbul for Freedom of Expression. To her left, Alexander Tkachenko, then general secretary of the Russian Centre.