The following is a link to McGarr Solictors’ article which brings into the discussion aspects of  the issue which may interest and inform members.

” You may also have noticed the sudden flurry of media appearances and debates on radio around the issue of Minister of State Seán Sherlock’s plan to introduce a law to allow the music labels (and other copyright holders) to seek injunctions forcing Irish ISPs to block access to sites they don’t like.

“I will introduce this imminently, by the end of January.”
- Minister Sherlock, Sunday Business Post, 22^nd Jan 2012

This SOPA Ireland law, as it is is called, is similar to the proposals defeated in the US only a week ago after a mass uprising of grassroots protest- first from Reddit, and then joined by the biggest names on the net- Google, Wikipedia and so on.

However, unlike that US law, people here can’t even expect to have this blocking law debated in their legislature. The Minister has said that he intends to deal with the matter by way of a Ministerial Order. Nor has he published the text of the law. The first we, the people of Ireland, will know about the text of this law will be when it is signed and brought into force. ”

http://www.mcgarrsolicitors.ie/2012/01/25/stop-sopa-ireland-we-must-have-openness-not-murky-backroom-deal/

Members and associates of Irish PEN may wish to use the comment form to add in further reports and garnered information on the issue of debate in this sensitive area of legislation. Many of us now are using blogs, websites,and varieties of social-media to communicate with our affiliates on a daily and weekly basis. The issue of Arts Practice and  the use of social-media tools has not been fully exploited in Ireland, but we have seen it’s potential at a cross-committee basis.

ISPAI reactions to the proposed legislation : http://www.ispai.ie/

 Irish Times article here  http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2012/0127/1224310799439.html

A few days from now a large delegation – ten of us – will go to Mexico City . This will be a strong expression of solidarity for Mexican writers and journalists. It will also be unprecedented, with the entire Executive going – Hori Takeaki , Eric Lax and myself – as well as the Chair of the Writers in Prison Committee – Marian Botsford Fraser – and representatives of all four North American Centres, as well as the English and Japanese, all going to stand in public with our Mexican colleagues. Émile Martel, Russell Banks, Adrienne Clarkson, Gillian Slovo, Larry Siems and Adam Somers, as well as Renu Mandhane, head of the International Human Rights Program of the University of Toronto ’s Faculty of Law, will join the Executive.

We will be working with the three Mexican PEN Centres – Mexico , Guadalajara and San Miguel Allende. The culmination of this will be a public event organized by Jennifer Clement, President of PEN Mexico , and her members, involving the delegation and some 50 Mexican writers on Sunday, January 29.

There is also a public letter of solidarity to Mexican writers which I hope you will all sign. It is coming to you separately.

This is not a delegation of experts. It is a delegation of writers using our public voice. And what we do and say will be quickly transmitted to you in the hope that you will respond in your own countries.

This is all part of a sustained Mexican PEN campaign. Recently the Day of the Dead initiative initiated by Jens Lohman of Danish PEN and Tony Cohan of San Miguel PEN, spread our concerns about the threats faced by Mexican journalists throughout our membership. We hope that these new Mexican initiative will take on our campaign a stage further.

The PEN International Website

A lot of you are already sending material to the new website. This is what we need: Centres all over the world telling the rest of PEN about their work and their risks. Please contribute.

Finally, these last few weeks have been moving and historically important for Czech writers and for the belief in freedom of expression that all of us have. First, our former President, Jiří Gruša, one of the leading dissident writers of the post war period died. Then Václav Havel, about whom a great deal has rightly been written around the world. Then Ivan Jirous, whom Paul Wilson called the “leader of the Cultural Opposition”. Jirous was a poet, essayist and leader of the psychedelic rock band Plastic People of the Universe. The struggle to get him out of prison in part inspired the Chapter 77 movement. And finally, Josef Škvorecký has died, another great writer and leading dissident. Living in exile in Toronto he created 68 Publishers in 1971 and for two decades published banned Czech and Slovak writers. The books then made their way illegally back into Czechoslovakia . Of course, there are many more names, but when four courageous and inspired writers die almost together it should be marked as an important moment for all of us in PEN.

Best wishes,

John Ralston Saul

EDIT: The link to the PENProtesta petition against impunity in Mexico is available here

The  IPWWC , the International PEN Women Writer’s Committee.

“The Women Writers’ Committee was set up in 1991 to promote certain issues faced by women writers around the world – challenges at family and national levels such as unequal education, unequal access to resources and actual prohibition from writing.

The committee reaches out to both aspiring and practising women writers through PEN Centres and other organisations and networks, and works with the Writers in Prison Committee on behalf of incarcerated or endangered women writers.

Representatives from the committee attend meetings of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. The committee has held conferences in countries such as Nepal, Kyrgyzstan and Senegal, and has published special newsletters. It uses Facebook to connect the work of women writers to the world. “

The Diversity Blog was launched on the 12/01/2012 and is encouraging women writers to contribute in creative areas ,like translation, poetry and literature. The information and contacts are carried at  this link.  More than ever social-media outlets like Facebook are contributing to new connections between women writers.  PEN International is facilitating these contacts across a variety of platforms which include Websites, Facebook and Twitter. There are currently two discussion groups for members and associates of PEN available on the Facebook platform, the PEN International discussion group (231 members) and the PEN International group of writers sharing opinions and texts.

Members can choose to contribute to these above-mentioned groups , or to link up with their international colleagues through sites like Diversity. Irish PEN has a Facebook account where queries regarding social-media can be sent by direct-messaging, alternatively contacts can be addressed to the Irish PEN  addresses, which I am linking  below here.

Useful Irish PEN Contacts

Irish PEN Phone Number : 087 966 0770

Irish PEN Email Contact : info@irishpen.com

Tweet to @PENireland

More than 100 poets from the 5 continents have participated every year since 1989.

The city of Trois Rivieres in on the St Lawrence seaway, half way between Montreal and Quebec. We provide travel for poets to and from Montreal airport.

There are 400 poems on walls in the city. We display 5000 in a park in the town centre during the festival.

The guest poets have only one thing to do – read their poems 2 or 3 times a day, no lectures. But they must already have at least 30 poems translated into French, as Quebec is 80% French-speaking, and our city is 99%.

One of our group will introduce the poet before the reading, read their poem in French, and then the poet will read it in his native language.

There will be about 350-400 readings of poems during the 10 day festival period,

28 September to 7 October.

More than 10000 people will attend 4-7 readings, out of the 40000 attendees.

We offer poets hospitality in a hotel, with a daily allowance for meals and another for readings.

The programme of the 27^th festival is on our website, as well as an incomplete list of previous participants.

For 2012, invitations are only offered to members of a PEN CLUB, but not in future years.

We would like to host an Irish poet every year.          Information is at link :  www.fiptr.com

Tweet

'Unsweet Dreams' by Anne Le Marquand Hartigan

‘Unsweet Dreams’ by Anne Le Marquand Hartigan is a new collection of poetry will be launched  next Wednesday 7th December at the Irish Writers’ Centre.

Information about the book is available from the Salmon Website :  http://www.salmonpoetry.com/details.php?ID=244&a=109

]]> http://www.irishpen.com/wordpress/2011/12/01/launch-of-unsweet-dreams-by-anne-le-marquand-hartigan-7th-december-iwc/feed/ 0 http://www.irishpen.com/wordpress/2011/08/17/pen-american-center-literature-knows-no-frontiers-john-galsworthy-and-the-shaping-of-pen/ http://www.irishpen.com/wordpress/2011/08/17/pen-american-center-literature-knows-no-frontiers-john-galsworthy-and-the-shaping-of-pen/#comments Wed, 17 Aug 2011 08:55:19 +0000 Christine Murray http://www.irishpen.com/wordpress/?p=1065  

The 90th Anniversary of International PEN occurs in 2012.
This archive piece by PEN American Center sets out some of the
history of International PEN.

International PEN  has much to celebrate with 20,000 writers in 100
countries keeping in touch through conference, committee and widespread
use of social-media. I am including as link , a monthly letter from  John Ralston Saul
to our  International PEN members.

“This past Sunday marked the birthday of English novelist, playwright, and Nobel Laureate John Galsworthy (1867–1933), the first President of PEN International and author of the first three articles of PEN’s charter. As we look forward to our 90th anniversary in 2012, we also look back to our founding principles, which were written in a period with parallels to today’s uncertain climate for free expression. ”

http://www.pen.org/blog/?p=2086

History of the PEN Charter : http://www.irishpen.com/wordpress/history-of-the-pen-charter/
Letter from John Ralston Saul to PEN members  http://www.internationalpen.org.uk/go/news/monthly-letter-from-john-ralston-saul-to-the-membership

“Our thoughts are with Norwegian PEN, its members, our friends and supporters at the Fritt Ord Foundation, Royal Ministry of Foreign Affairs, International Cities of Refuge Network, and Norwegian publishers as well as all the people of Norway.

Norway’s tolerant and open-minded approach to the world and its deep commitment to human rights makes the attack even more shocking. Yet we believe that these very qualities will help our Norwegian friends and colleagues to find ways to overcome these very terrible events with dignity and resolve. ”

John Ralston Saul, International President
Takeaki Hori, International Secretary

http://www.twitlonger.com/show/bvcl9d

Ladies and gentlemen, is my pleasure to address you as Chair of Irish PEN on the occasion of our AGM. Our year began late. It was July or August when our previous honourable chairperson, Anne Hartigan, resigned due to work pressures and I was asked to take over as chair. Most of the outgoing committee also resigned, taking with them years of experience and knowledge. Only three remained, Dee, Tony and myself.

I was delighted to be asked to become Chair although it was a somewhat daunting prospect. I knew I could not achieve anything without a working and committed committee and, to be honest, the viability of Irish PEN was very much in question. If volunteers would not emerge to form a new committee then it seemed that it may well have been time to wrap up this august organisation, founded by Lady Gregory, and with literary greats like W.B. Yeats, Lord Longford, Sean O’Faolain, Liam O’Flaherty, Frank O’Connor, Mary Lavin, Kate O’Brien, Eavan Boland, Sam McAughtry, John Banville, Joseph O’Connor, and our President, Brian Friel on our membership roll of honour, to name but a few.

In short, the volunteers volunteered! And we have had, what for me has a very humbling and remarkable experience, watching individual volunteers within the committee take on their role and run with it.

Vanessa with her ‘can-do’ attitude to everything, and she has done a marvellous job of editing the newsletter both in the hardcopy versions and also by developing the online Aweber electronic version. She’s also done our PR, she has been the holder of the Irish PEN mobile phone for the last several months, and on her initiative we now have a wonderful Irish PEN banner.

Dee has been a power of strength to me, not only doing the monthly minutes faithfully and the minutes we’ve just read at today’s meeting from last year’s AGM. She has also provided encouragement to me and, very importantly, continuity with previous committees. I’m sorry that Dee won’t be available to continue on the committee in the new year and, on a personal note, and on your behalf, I thank her for all she has done. We will miss her greatly.

Carol has being a wonderful support spending hours and days writing letters and correspondence on our behalf when most of us are not even aware that she’s beavering away doing this. She has also taken a keen interest in the Irish PEN archive and as you know she’s our representative on the UNESCO city of literature committee.

Kay was one of the first to volunteer to join the new committee, initially agreeing to be treasurer, and then very willingly moving aside when Timmy came on board, who is a qualified accountant. She then took on chairing the subcommittee for the Irish PEN dinner and award. And she did a fantastic job, a superb job – what a wonderful night that was – and more recently she has volunteered to give of her time and go to Serbia for the PEN conference in September.

What can I say about Emer? Our membership lists and database were in a bit of a mess, to say the least. Emer willingly took on the job of sorting out the database, and devising the online confidential live database which is continually renewed and kept fresh. She is also the first representative from Irish PEN to attend a PEN International event for several years, and she is the first person in Irish PEN for some time to have the Writers in Prison Committee brief, which is a central part of what we are meant to be about as Irish PEN, in association with our international colleagues worldwide.

It is fabulous having Timmy on board, and very reassuring knowing he is a qualified accountant. He is also a great encourager and supporter and he has been efficient and practical from the word go, helping me to submit grant applications to the Arts Council and to Dublin City Arts Office. And on that point, I want to take this formal opportunity to thank both the Arts Council and Dublin City Arts Office for their continued financial support to Irish PEN.

I thank Tony for his membership of the committee, for the continuity he brings with him as a former chair, the experience he brings as an honorary member, and for his generosity in not only volunteering to attend the Belgrade conference, but for offering to pay his own way, and we’re lucky that he is in a position that he is able to do so.

The latest member of our team is Christine, and as with the whole committee, we are so lucky with what she brings to the table, her competence and familiarity and interest in Facebook and Twitter, her computer competence, and her willingness also to take on the role of Webmaster, a job she is doing very well indeed.

Kristi cannot be here tonight and we are sorry to be losing her too. She is emigrating. Since joining the committee only some months ago she has shown herself to be utterly reliable, committed, intelligent, competent, gracious, indeed as have you all. She did a wonderful job of the website, especially in updating it on the blasphemy campaign. And she was brilliant as e-mail manager, knowing the emails I didn’t need to see, dealing with them, and forwarding them to the appropriate person. And it was also Kristi who handled bookings for events, and she devised an online list for this purpose on the email site. Again, on my own behalf and on behalf of the committee and our members, I thank Kristi for all she has done, and we wish her well in her move from Ireland.

I also want to acknowledge Catherine Daly and Helen Flanagan, both of whom were on the committee for some time. Catherine, a former chair, needed to resign due to family commitments and Helen, who was our first intern, moved on to other work. We are grateful to them both.

I’m happy to report that there have been major achievements in the past year. The most outstanding one was the Irish PEN dinner, which was a wonderful affair. Kay Boland and her subcommittee members Vanessa, Kristi and Dee, made it all happen, as if by magic. At least it felt like magic to me but I’m sure that Kay, Vanessa, Kristi, and Dee know the blood, sweat and tears that went into it. It was a grand location, great to give the award to Colm Tóibín, and an excellent idea – I can’t remember whose it was – to have invited Mary Cloake, Director of the Arts Council, to make the presentation, and she delivered a very fine, highly researched speech.

Another achievement is the newsletter. Not only did we get three hardcopy newsletters written, edited and posted out, and thanks also to those who stuffed envelopes, I think Vanessa, Carol and Dee – apologies if I’ve left anyone out here – but Vanessa also introduced the Aweber format for electronic newsletters, which look well and form a new email database to complement Emer’s even more comprehensive live database.

Apart from the annual dinner, we have also had a superb programme of monthly events. In October 2010, we looked at the changing face of publishing and in particular at electronic publishing. That month we had Eoin Purcell of Irish Publishing News and Greenlampmedia.com. Gareth Cuddy, director of DirectEBooks.com was there too, as was Catherine Ryan Howard, an author who took the electronic route to publishing, and the event was very competently chaired by Vanessa.

In November 2010 we had our annual ‘Get Published’ event, again chaired by Vanessa. Speakers that night included Sheila Crowley, the literary agent with Curtis Brown; Jean Harrington, President of Publishing Ireland, and Brian Langan, editor with Transworld Ireland.

Our scheduled event in December, 2010, like almost everything else that month throughout Ireland, had to be cancelled because of the freezing conditions.

We had a wonderful debate in March of this year on ‘What makes a good book?’ I was delighted to chair that event which included Patricia Deevy, editorial director of Penguin Ireland, Bob Johnson of the Gutter Book Shop, Ciaran Carty of the sadly now defunct Sunday Tribune but his literary page on new Irish writing has now happily found a new home with the Irish Independent; and there was the much loved book lover Margaret McCann from the Wise Owl Book Club in Navan, who gave us an all-important reader’s perspective.

What a joy it was for those present to hear Patrick Mason, famous director at the Abbey Theatre, speak to us here last month, and how he brought alive so many moments, most memorably for me his account of the ending of a performance of Chekhov’s ‘The Cherry Orchard’ directed by Peter Brook, when all the doors were locked, the darkness fell and that single old man emerges, lies down, under a barely visible shaft of light, and dies.

And tonight, after the business of this AGM is concluded, we have Joseph O’Connor to look forward to, the event being chaired by Tony. I have been pestering Joseph to come for some time so I’m thrilled he’ll be here tonight.

Another important achievement this year has been our reconnection with PEN International. We had let that drop, so much so that I really didn’t know anything about PEN International, and I was delighted to have conversations during the year with Jonathan Heawood, Director of English PEN, and, of course, with Dublin man Frank Geary, Interim Director of PEN International. I was very happy that Frank could join us at our annual dinner and I met him again the following morning for discussions, which in turn has led to our greater awareness of the PEN Charter, Irish PEN’s new involvement in the Writers in Prison Committee, and our having two representatives at next September’s PEN conference in Belgrade. I want to thank Christine as well for her initiative such that now anyone can go to our website, click on a button, and sign up to the PEN Charter.

Another major achievement in the last year has been our agreement as a committee to campaign for a referendum to remove blasphemy from the Irish constitution. We have agreed an Irish PEN position paper, which is on our website, we have written to ministers, thanks to Kay, and to former recipients of the Irish PEN Award thanks to Carol. We have sent out press releases, and we have received unprecedented support from PEN International in our campaign. They issued a statement supporting us, sent it to the Minister for Justice, and took the unusual step of sending it to the Irish media as well.

Another significant achievement, and thanks to Timmy for this, is our successful application for grants, without which, quite simply, we could not function. That we have a healthy financial situation cannot be taken for granted, and I thank Timmy again for his work in this regard.

Having a presence on Facebook and Twitter is another welcome development, just in the last few months. How lucky we are that Christine walked in that door some months ago.

Having a Writers in Prison Committee in Irish PEN is another very welcome development the past year. Emer and I have already this year made representations on behalf of a writer from abroad who is in imminent danger of deportation from Ireland. This is a new activity for Irish PEN in Ireland, at least in recent years.

The ordinary humdrum activities of writing letters, writing minutes, checking e-mail, issuing press releases, updating the website, writing the newsletter, turning up at meetings, and on time, are the things which keep the engine ticking over. I thank each member of the committee for the quiet, unsung work that you do for Irish PEN, our members and our charter.

I also want to thank our members and associates for paying their subscriptions, which we need, and for turning up at events and at the annual dinner.

Issues that I think we need to address next year include poor attendances at some events, declining membership numbers even as, if I may say so, the committee is more committed and hard-working than ever. With declining membership come fewer subscriptions and a depletion of our funds. I think we need to ask ourselves why it is that eminent writers might join but not renew. As for associate members, there are now many organisations, private or public, offering courses, opportunities to meet editors and writers, and of course there is the Internet which is a free source of so much information. If we think, for instance, of events run by the Irish Writers Centre or the many literary festivals or Poetry Ireland, and other writer organisations, it strikes me that what we need to do is to focus on our unique selling point. Our long and honourable tradition, with so many Irish literary luminaries having been members, is one aspect of what makes us different. A second distinguishing feature is our commitment to free speech and to the PEN Charter, which each member is required sign and commit to. Perhaps we need to form alliances with the likes of Amnesty International here in Ireland, and others concerned about free speech and human rights. The third element of our unique selling point is that we belong to an international organisation, that we participate in it, and as has been the case so very recently, we are supported by it. And a fourth is that we defend people incarcerated or discriminated against because of their thoughts and words, oral or written.

Looking ahead, it is unlikely that the referendum on blasphemy will be held this year. I suspect it will be one of the many issues which will be dealt with in the Constitutional Convention promised for next year. But the referendum will come and we need to have a plan to make, and win, the argument. We need to come up with a strategy to communicate to the electorate why they should vote to delete blasphemy from the Irish constitution. And speaking of constitutions, we also need to update our own Irish PEN constitution.

We became aware over the year that English PEN employs seven or eight people. Might it be possible for Irish PEN to employ one or two or three in the future? Could we? To what end? And who might fund us? This is perhaps something that the new committee could explore.

Let us not forget too that each of us has our own personal writing ambition, I assume. I would like to see a situation, particularly for people who serve on the committee and who work so hard for not a button, in fact it costs us to take part, I’d like if the work we do could somehow move forward our own personal aspirations as writers. Perhaps we can somehow help one another towards our personal writing goals, whether to finish that novel, write a bestseller or earn a few bob.

We do need to find replacements for Dee and for Kristi and I hope at least two people will make themselves available to join the committee. Please don’t be shy. You will be very welcome.

Finally, I have really enjoyed this year, and I have been privileged to be your Chair. I have enjoyed the adventure. And if the adventure next year is half as good and half as fruitful as it has been this year, I should be happy. I’m looking forward to the ride. Thank you.

The Link to the PEN International Charter follows here :

https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dG5sOXVVYU1IY1RITnRPb08wZnBnTmc6MQ

Sarah Webb & Marita Conlon McKenna at launch of Sarah's latest book

The launch of Sarah Webb’s new novel The Loving Kind, published by Pan Macmillan, took place at Hughes and Hughes, Dun Laoghaire on Wednesday 3^rd Feb 2010. It was launched by Irish PEN Treasurer and former Chair, Marita Conlon McKenna and then at the Royal St George Yacht Club. Sarah’s books Amy Green 2 and Emma the Penguin are ever popular books with younger readers.