“There’s no land for us,” writes the poet Erkan Kadir in his poem “Poverty” about the tragic destiny of the Uyghur in China. In 2016 he left the Xinjiang Province in China for studies in Turkey, but...

In 2003 the writer and poet Abdushukur Muhammet fled the oppression in the Xinjiang Province in China. Today he lives with his family in Sweden. His three published works in Uyghur can no longer be...

In 2015 the Iranian poet and activist Fatemeh Ekhtesari was sentenced to 99 lashes and eleven and a half years of imprisonment for alleged crimes against the Islamic regime—immoral conduct and...

Can one be imprisoned for having published a poem on one’s Facebook page? The answer is yes—in Uganda. In August 2019 the Ugandan writer and women’s rights activist Stella Nyanzi was sentenced to...

Writers all over the world are today subjected to daily threats for practicing their basic human rights to freely express what they want in whichever language they choose. During her term of office...

Alfred Msdala is a poet, critic, and currently the chairperson of PEN Malawi. During his term as chairperson, PEN Malawi has established a translation committee with the aim of translating important...

Enriqueta Lunez, born in Chiapas in Mexico in 1981, is a poet and writer who belongs to the new generation of Tsotsil writers in the country writing in Tsotsil instead of Spanish. Her poems revolve...

Writer and poet Cao Shuying was born in Harbin in northern China, but is currently living in Hong Kong. PEN/Opp publishes one of her poems—a poem where an unruly rebellious force is ever present:...

Lui Waitong’s poem “Read and Burn” is a personal text that depicts generations of suffering against the foil of Chinese history. The author takes a retrospective look at her maternal grandfather who...

“They did everything to keep us asleep,” says Tammy Ho Lai-Ming, writer and Chairperson of PEN Hong Kong, in one of her poems. Ever present in her poetry is the worry she feels for the future of Hong...