The launch of English PEN’s world bookshelf – a collection of some of the most exciting contemporary literature in translation – essential reading for everyone who cares about international writing

Wednesday 30  April, 7pm

Join English PEN and Foyles Bookshop for the launch of the new online world bookshelf, a gateway to the most exciting international literature, with profiles of PEN award-winning books as well as news and blogs from translators around the world.

The evening will include a drinks reception and a discussion with author Elif Shafak and translator Frank Wynne about great books in translation that have inspired, intrigued and challenged them. The evenings discussions will be lead by BBC World Book Club presenter Harriett Gilbert.

This event is free but booking is essential.

Please email [email protected] to reserve your space.

Harriett Gilbert is the presenter of The World Book Club on the BBC World Service and A Good Read on BBC Radio 4. Until 2008, she was also the programme director of the MA in Creative writing (novels) at City University, London and in 2011 she was a judges for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize.

Elif Shafak is Turkey’s most-read woman writer and an award-winning novelist. She writes in both English and Turkish, and has published 13 books, nine of which are novels, including: The Bastard of Istanbul, The Forty Rules of Love, Honour and her nonfiction memoir Black Milk (by Penguin/Viking). Her books have been translated into more than forty languages.

Frank Wynne is a literary translator. He began translating literature in the late 1990s, and in 2001 decided to devote himself to this full time. He has translated works by, among others, Michel Houellebecq, Frédéric Beigbeder, Ahmadou Kourouma, Boualem Sansal, Claude Lanzmann, Tómas Eloy Martínez and Almudena Grandes.  His work has earned him a number of awards, including the  Scott Moncrieff Prize  and the Premio Valle Inclán.