Season’s Greetings Initiative

As many of you will remember from previous years, each year between
November and February, when many religious and secular holidays fall,
PEN encourages our members and friends to send Season’s Greetings cards
to imprisoned and persecuted writers around the world. To mark the 90th
anniversary of English PEN we would like to invite you all to write a
card to one or more of our current cases of concern, and to encourage
your friends and colleagues to do the same.

Many
writers who have received these cards have told us of how much it meant
to them to be remembered by their colleagues in this way. Vietnamese
editor Tran Khai Thanh Thuy, who was granted early release from prison
this year and is now living in exile in the United States, spoke of
their significance in a letter to PEN following her release:

How
can I convey what it is I felt when I received your letters; every word
penetrating my heart like drops of honey carrying those most earnest
and heartfelt thoughts from you and PEN…

If you are
interested in being involved in this extremely worthwhile initiative,
please email cat@englishpen.org to request the list for 2011-2012.

(NB.
These addresses should be treated as confidential, and as such must not
be posted on a website or otherwise made public as this may lead to
misuse by others.)

Season’s Greetings Guidelines

You
may wish to send cards or emails to all those on the list or you might
decide to focus on a particular region, country or case – it is entirely
up to you. All we ask is that you let us know which of the cases you
decide to write to so that we can keep a record of how many cards are
sent to each of the prisoners.

As the prisoners represent a
variety of religious faiths, it is strongly advised that you do not send
cards with overtly religious symbolism. Instead, we recommend that you
send general greetings or tourist cards from your town.
 
Should you wish to write to a particular country but are worried by language limitations, please visit the ‘Translated Greetings‘
page of the website. There you will find a brief message translated
into Azerbaijani, Spanish, French, Mandarin, Turkish and Uzbek which you
may choose to include alongside your own message where appropriate.

It
is important to put your return address on the card (or the office
address of English PEN if you would prefer) so that if the person is
able to reply they can do so. Please do let us know if you receive a
response, and send us a copy for our records if possible.

If you have any queries about the initiative please email cat@englishpen.org

Many thanks and very best wishes to you all for 2012.