The writers’ association PEN has been in trouble for a long time. After Deniz Yücel resigned as president, he is planning the next step with other authors.
After the quarrels at the writers’ association PEN, an alternative association is to be formed. Around 230 authors want to found PEN Berlin, as journalist Deniz Yücel announced on Twitter on Tuesday.
The supporters include Daniel Kehlmann (“Tyll”), Christian Kracht (“Eurotrash”) and Eva Menasse (“Dunkelblum”). Several media had previously reported on the project. The association is to be founded on Friday in the Berlin Literature House.
“We want a new PEN,” it said on the website. “A contemporary and diverse PEN in which writers and translators of all literary and journalistic genres who write in German or live in Germany come together.” A new PEN is needed that “denounces grievances together and regardless of origin and attitude and helps those whose freedom of expression is threatened”.
Most recently, there had been controversy about the writers’ association PEN-Zentrum Deutschland, of which Yücel was president for several months. The leadership style was hotly debated. Statements made by Yücel, who spoke out in favor of a no-fly zone in Ukraine during the Lit.Cologne festival, were also debated. Although a motion to vote Yücel out of office failed, he surprisingly resigned from office in mid-May.
“important people” and “self-promoters”
“I don’t want to be a figurehead for this bratwurst stand,” the 48-year-old said at the conference in Gotha. The majority of the members are “important and self-portrayal” who have hijacked the association and for the persecuted authors are only accessories. There are more than 140 writers’ associations worldwide, united in the international PEN. The three letters stand for the words Poets, Essayists and Novelists.
According to the announcement, the new association should include Karen Köhler (“Miroloi”), Lucy Fricke (“Die Diplomatin”) and Ursula Krechel (“Landgericht”), as well as Thea Dorn, who moderates the “Literary Quartet” on ZDF, Mithu M Sanyal (“Identitti”), Christian Berkel (“Ada”) and Feridun Zaimoglu (“Hinterland”).
The conference in Gotha was only the tipping point of a longer development, said writer Menasse of the German Press Agency. In recent years there have been repeated disputes. “Something’s been going wrong for a long time.” The immovability of certain relationships had become very visible.
No more president or general secretary
According to her, the new project has been in the works since mid-May. She found the rounds to be constructive. The question was hotly debated: “Is it worth trying to reform the old PEN?” A majority was then for a new foundation. PEN Berlin wants to do without titles such as president, vice-president and general secretary, “which, apart from their pomp and decorum, have no intrinsic necessity”. Instead, there should be a board made up of equal numbers of men and women.
Menasse does not see the fact that some are still members of the PEN center as a problem. She believes that some of them have retained their membership for the time being out of sentimentality and are seeing how the new project is getting off the ground. “I don’t see what speaks against it at the moment.”
The German PEN center based in Darmstadt sees the announced founding as an addition to its work. “We see this as an enrichment of PEN’s work in the effort to reposition ourselves,” said General Secretary Claudia Guderian. You want to make contact. According to your information, some authors who would have known about the new foundation are also members of PEN. There were very, very few resignations. In addition, everyone has the freedom to found an association. (dpa)