The literary and journalistic communities are joining forces for the first time in Maltese history to set up a voluntary organisation that seeks to safeguard freedom of expression, among other pursuits.

Writers and journalists are in the process of setting up a PEN Centre in Malta, an offshoot of PEN International – a worldwide association promoting friendship and intellectual co-operation among writers, which fights for freedom of expression and represents the conscience of world literature. 

“It’s a first for Malta to have such a diverse group of professionals with unique strengths sitting at the same table, collaborating and advocating for this cause in a structured environment,” said writer Maria Mangion, who officially kicked off the procedure to establish PEN Malta.

“PEN Malta will be increasing awareness of the systemic and political faults that stand as impediments to freedom of expression, and seeking to address them with the first independent, collective union of the country’s foremost writers, journalists, artists and activists.”

All of this will be taking place in a local context, so the proposed centre aims to bring writers, editors, bloggers, publishers, translators, academics, and artists from all walks of life together for a common purpose.

Maria Mangion.

The plan is to launch PEN Malta later this year – coinciding  with the 100th anniversary of PEN International, founded by English writer Catherine Amy Dawson-Scott in London in 1921, with Nobel Prize-winning author John
Galsworthy as its first president. 

But are such organisations necessary a century later? 

“Despite giant leaps forward in terms of human rights since the last century and the near-ubiquity of digital media, freedom of speech and of the press are no more guaranteed in 2021 than they were in 1921. Even within the EU, member states such as Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Bulgaria, and Slovenia are suffering the social consequences of a suffocated media where authoritarian agendas are winning over people’s liberties and reasoned, inclusive discourse…  It’s not an exaggeration to say that Malta’s World Press Freedom Index has been in freefall since 2017, with the country’s media landscape having now been categorised as a ‘problematic’ situation by Reporters Without Borders,” said Mangion.

Events in Malta’s recent history also underscore the need for such an organisation.

The shocking assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia in October 2017 and its political aftermath have highlighted the need for writers in Malta to organise themselves in the interests of defending their peers against grave threats to their safety, said Mangion. 

PEN Malta will seek to follow in the footsteps of the parent organisation and bring together all forms of writers: creative writers who construct narratives to shed light on the complexity of human life and thought; and journalists who uncover facts. 

Despite being a small nation, there’s the tendency for local writers – especially those from marginalised backgrounds, such as migrants and refugees – to operate in bubbles with little overlap between them. PEN Malta will seek to address these issues by providing a safe space for all writers’ voices to be heard in as unshackled an environment as possible. 

“We also pledge to tackle challenges such as the dismally low levels of readership and cultural participation in Malta.”

At the moment, the steering committee is made up of members from the literary and journalistic community – including Clare Azzopardi, Lizzie Eldridge, Victor Calleja, Miriam Calleja Shaw, Manuel Delia, Immanuel Mifsud, Joe Mizzi – is driving the administrative and strategic process forward until the first board and president are officially in place.