PEN Atlas this week features Taiwanese author Wu Ming-Yi, who takes us through the Great Pacific Trash Vortex, indigenous island tribes, and the ancient practice of storytelling - all of which inspired his first novel to be translated into English
Adam Thirlwell takes us through the utopian goals and surprising results of Multiples, an experiment in translation. Charting dozens of countries, languages and authors, this anthology is playful yet subversive, questioning the purpose of translation, the idea of style and the future of the novel
Kaya Genç introduces PEN Atlas readers to Şavkar Altınel: travel writer, inspiration for a famous literary character, translator of famous British poets and resident of Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire. But above all Altınel is a poet in his own right, comparable with Larkin for his 'dry lyricism' and nostalgia.
In another fascinating piece for PEN Atlas, Gazmend Kapllani recounts his journey through languages, the difficulties and opportunities of being a multi-lingual author and how the language of the Other goes back to Homer and the birth of storytelling
Need a good book to go with the good weather? In the lead-up to this evening's English PEN Summer Party, Marina Warner, James Meek, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, Blake Morrision, and many more offer their tips for what to read in translation this summer.
This week PEN Atlas returns to Turkey for an update on Gezi Park. Müge İplikçi reflects on recent events and draws parallels between the treatment of protestors and the ongoing stifling of Turkish writers, who work in a system in which profit is the only validation.
From constant earthquakes to a Borges story, Giorgio Vasta's dispatch for PEN Atlas offers an original, honest and illuminating take on the current state of Italy and its politics
Ahead of the Africa Writes festival 2013 (5-7 July) PEN Atlas hears from African writer Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o on his friend and mentor Chinua Achebe. Ngũgĩ will appear in conversation with his son Mukoma wa Ngũgĩ on Saturday 6 July at the British Library.
Patricio Pron writes a moving piece for PEN Atlas, about an encounter in a small German city that made him reflect on collective guilt, individual responsibility and the nature of the past - both for a person and a country
Hakan Günday unpacks the notion of authority and censorship, and considers its effects on civilians
In this week's second PEN Atlas dispatch, Meike Ziervogel from Peirene Press makes the case for the novella, charting the history of the form, and reflecting on her experience publishing great novellas in translation from around Europe
Following recent events, PEN Atlas is running an additional dispatch this week from Turkey. Kaya Genç writes for us about Nâzım Hikmet Ran, whose poem 'The Walnut Tree' has taken on a prophetic turn and an inspirational one in light of Gezi Park
In the latest of our literary dispatches from Turkey, Mario Levi contemplates the sounds of the city he grew up in, and the stories that lie behind them for those willing to listen
Oray Egin reports on the continuing protests in Turkey, why they began in Gezi Park and what the writers of the country owe to those marching on the streets
Strange coincidences bring together two literary traditions in today's PEN Atlas piece by Oksana Zabuzhko, which explores Ukrainian and Eastern European authors, their debt to history and their unjustly hidden classics
Yasmine El Rashidi, contributor to the PEN-award-winning title Writing Revolution: The Voices from Tunis to Damascus, tells PEN Atlas about growing up learning English: exile and community, being alienated and finding her voice
Birgit Vanderbeke introduces PEN Atlas readers to her book The Mussel Feast - a subtly political work that is steeped in metaphor - and her experience of penning her first novel at such a poignant moment in German history