PEN International's Free the Word! Festival

Back in December, we mentioned the celebration of world literature that PEN International was putting together to take place just prior to the London Book Fair.

At that time, there weren’t many details, but now, they have a name—“Free the Word!”—and an impressive schedule of events.

Running from Friday, April 11th through the 13th, the festival will include a slew of authors and translators, including Alaa Al Aswany, Emine Sevgi Özdamar, Maureen Freely, Yang Lian, Tze Ming Mok, Sjón, Azar Nafisi, Daniel Pennac, Alberto Manguel, Salman Rushdie, and Lisa Appignanesi, among many others.

Overall, this looks like a fantastic festival, and it’s great that it coincides with the London Book Fair, providing publishers, editors, journalists, etc., with another reason to spend a lot of time in London celebrating international writing.