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| PEN World Voices | |
|---|---|
| Name | PEN World Voices |
| Location | New York City |
| Founded | 2004 |
| Founder | Salman Rushdie, Esther Allen, Michael Roberts |
| Frequency | Annual |
PEN World Voices
PEN World Voices is an international literary festival based in New York City that convenes writers, journalists, translators, activists, and public intellectuals from across the globe. The festival has featured conversations, readings, and debates on literature, human rights, translation, censorship, and diasporic identities, attracting participants associated with institutions such as Harvard University, Columbia University, New York University, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. Over its history it has intersected with movements and moments involving figures linked to Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Freedom of Expression campaigns, and major publishing houses like Penguin Random House and HarperCollins.
PEN World Voices was launched in 2004 by a coalition including Salman Rushdie and Esther Allen amid post-9/11 debates that engaged personalities tied to Brookings Institution, Council on Foreign Relations, and cultural forums such as Southbank Centre. Early editions brought together transnational voices from contexts associated with Iraq War, Arab Spring, Soviet Union dissidents, and Latin American writers connected to Gabriel García Márquez’s legacy and the Bogotá39 cohort. The festival evolved through collaborations with arts venues like Lincoln Center, The Public Theater, and university theaters at Columbia University, expanding programming during anniversaries that referenced events like Sackler Prize discussions and responses to crises including the Syrian civil war and debates following the Charlie Hebdo shooting.
The festival has been organized by a mix of editors, translators, and nonprofit directors affiliated with PEN International, PEN America, and independent cultural nonprofits interacting with trustees from institutions such as Carnegie Corporation, Ford Foundation, and Rockefeller Foundation. Artistic directors and curators have included figures who previously worked with The Paris Review, Granta, or academic departments at Columbia University and New York University. Leadership structures have involved boards with members connected to Random House, Faber and Faber, and public intellectuals who taught at Princeton University and Yale University.
Programming has combined panels, keynote addresses, film screenings, and translation workshops featuring translators associated with PEN/Heim Translation Fund and book launches partnering with imprints like Knopf and Macmillan. Events have addressed topics linked to geopolitical flashpoints such as Ukraine crisis, Iranian political debates, and human-rights advocacy tied to Tibetan independence advocates. Festival series have included partnerships with cultural institutions such as Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, and festivals like Jaipur Literature Festival and Edinburgh International Book Festival.
Speakers have ranged from Nobel laureates and Booker Prize winners to journalists and activists. Notable participants include writers and public intellectuals connected to Salman Rushdie’s circle, Nobel-associated figures like Orhan Pamuk, Mario Vargas Llosa, and Doris Lessing; poets and novelists tied to Toni Morrison, Margaret Atwood, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Chinua Achebe; translators and critics linked to Susan Sontag, Edward Said, and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Journalists and commentators from The Washington Post, The Guardian, The New York Times Magazine, and broadcasters from BBC and NPR have participated alongside activists and dissidents connected to Aung San Suu Kyi’s advocacy networks, Ai Weiwei’s art activism, and legal figures linked to Amnesty International cases. Other participants have included authors associated with Salman Rushdie’s contemporaries, such as Ian McEwan, Zadie Smith, Jhumpa Lahiri, Haruki Murakami, Elif Şafak, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Clarice Lispector, Alice Walker, Vladimir Nabokov’s critical inheritors, and journalists tied to Maureen Dowd and Thomas Friedman.
While the festival itself is not a prize-granting body comparable to the Pulitzer Prize or Nobel Prize in Literature, it has been associated with award ceremonies, readings by laureates of the Man Booker Prize, National Book Award, Costa Book Award, and has featured recipients of the MacArthur Fellows Program, National Humanities Medal, and the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. Institutional partners and sponsors connected to foundations such as Carnegie Corporation of New York and Andrew W. Mellon Foundation have recognized the festival with grants and citations for cultural programming.
The festival has faced debate and criticism over programming choices, speaker invitations, and free-speech dilemmas that intersected with high-profile controversies involving figures linked to Salman Rushdie’s fatwa aftermath, debates over the representation of voices from Palestine and Israel, and the inclusion of participants associated with contentious regimes. Critics from outlets such as The New York Times, The Guardian, and The Atlantic have questioned editorial decisions; civil-society organizations like Human Rights Watch and advocacy groups affiliated with Article 19 have weighed in on censorship and platforming disputes. Internal debates mirrored broader cultural controversies found at events like Hay Festival and sparked discussions involving universities such as Columbia University and New York University about academic freedom and public programming.
Category:Literary festivals