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Theme: Burma

Editorial

Voices from Burma

It is easy to forget that Burma, or Myanmar as it is now called, is a huge country. It is smaller than Turkey but bigger...

Text: Ola Larsmo March 13 2014
Poetry

Wash your hands

The pseudonym Pandora is one the most influential poets in Burma today. In 2012, she published an anthology entitled Tuning: An Anthology of Myanmar Women Poets, which is the first book of its kind...

Text: Pandora March 13 2014
Article

What does PEN Myanmar mean for the country?

PEN was once a kind of social club for authors. The task is currently to found a PEN centre in Myanmar that can map the country's literature and its degree of freedom of expression, which plays a...

Text: Marian Botsford Fraser March 13 2014
Article

The Kachin: Culture of the mountain lords

One of the problems shaking the state of Myanmar can be found in the ethnic conflicts that have arisen in the wake of the faltering dictatorship. While the majority of the population speaks Burmese...

Text: Lucas Stewart March 13 2014
Fiction

Ludu and I

1946 saw the establishment of a regime-critical daily newspaper called Ludu. Today, it is a natural institution for dissident writers in Burma. Despite the constant pressure and threats it received...

Text: Bo Bo Lansin March 13 2014
Article

On the precipice: Burmese literature post-censorship

How does a country's literature recover after years of mass censorship? James Byrne, poet and founder of the poetry journal The Wolf, has followed the developments in Burma for many years and he was...

Text: James Byrne March 13 2014
Article

Two steps forward—two steps back?

Following the student protests in Burma in 1988, an independent magazine called The Irrawaddy was founded in exile in Thailand, and quickly became a respected source for news from the closed country...

Text: Aung Zaw March 13 2014
Fiction

Prison memoirs

Ma Thida is a Burmese human rights activist, author and currently chair of PEN Myanmar. In October 1993, she was sentenced to 20 years in prison for constituting “a danger to public order, and having...

Text: Ma Thida March 13 2014

Theme: Russia

Editorial

PEN/Opp explores russia

The headlines in the Swedish newspapers are at the time of writing dominated by the news that Swedish Neo-Nazis have...

Text: Ola Larsmo December 19 2013
Article

Gulag is alive and well in Mordovia

Everyone knows who the members of Pussy Riot are, and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova’s letter from the prison camp IK-14 was published worldwide. However, the Stalinist legacy in Russian prisons is still a...

Text: Pyotr Verzilov December 19 2013
Article

Freedom of speech—the Russian way

Government censorship is one of the oldest and most effective tool to control people's opinions and thoughts. Easiest...

Graphic: IKI IKE December 19 2013
Article

The king of Chechnya

Russian journalist Alex Tor specializes in Chechnya and Ingushetia in the North Caucasus, which have a history of war and violence. He has, among other things, written about corruption, refugees, and...

Text: Alex Tor December 19 2013
Article

Putin's fight for “traditional values”

“Traditional values” may sound like something harmless and old fashioned, until one realises that they are the opposite of the rights that are the foundation of modern democracy. Maria Chichtchenkova...

Text: Maria Chichtchenkova December 19 2013
Fiction

Notes from the provincial town of N

Anyone who believes that today's Russia is on the wrong track also hopes for political alternatives. However, the Russian opposition has often been fragmented, and how do you protest against a...

Text: Igor Saveliev December 19 2013
Poetry

So here we are

“It is only this generation of 20- and 30-year-olds that are able to write about the conditions here and now, and view the Soviet Union as a purely historical era,” writes critic Natasha Perova...

Text: Irina Bogatyreva December 19 2013
Poetry

Day of rage

The poet Kirill Medvedev is today considered to be one of the most promising poets of his generation. He was also one of the activists who openly protested the trial of Pussy Riot last year, when he...

Text: Kirill Medvedev December 19 2013
Poetry

From the cycle of poems “Cognitive capitalism”

Alexander Skidan (born in 1965) is one of Russia's most critical social poets. His poetry often emanates from the complex interplay between ethics, aesthetics and politics. In this newly written poem...

Text: Alexander Skidan December 19 2013
Article

What is the literary scene in russia like today?

In the past, the state made sure that life was difficult for writers in Russia. However, in contrast to journalists, Russian writers are today freer to write about what they want. Natasha Perova...

Text: Natasha Perova December 19 2013
Article

Russia in between security and democracy

Following 9/11, crucial social issues are often described as a choice between security and threat, rather than between freedom and oppression. This is the case also in Russia. There are, however...

Text: Johan Öberg December 19 2013
Article

What happened to the multinational Russia?

Nationalism grows increasingly stronger in Russia and it is a fact that xenophobia is gaining grounds in society today. “It is no longer just skinheads and radicalised young men shouting: ‘Attack the...

Text: Natalya Afanasyeva December 19 2013
Article

Islands of an archipelago

What is the best way to deal with the memory of the Great Terror? The famous journalist Yelena Rubinova has visited two of the places where the memory of Stalin's terror is still an open wound, like...

Text: Yelena Rubinova December 19 2013

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