MARTA HALPERT
The Fifty-ninth International
PEN Congress
Four hundred authors, journalists, translators, and their tourist-compan–
ions took part in the Fifty-ninth International PEN Congress this April,
held in the newly independent state of Croatia. In this case, the figure
"59" has only a numerical meaning, since the convention did not consti–
tute a quorum of the organization, the result of numerous cancellations
by
PEN chapters allover the world. Protesting the lack of freedom of ex–
pression and freedom of the press, as well as the various attacks on critical
writers and journalists, in Croatia, the Americans, Germans, and
Scandinavians
all
stayed away. Twenty-eight PEN chapters out of one
hundred-twenty demanded that the convention be postponed, and eleven
member-states asked only that the location be changed.
Many meters of fax paper unrolled between Zagreb and London,
from Paris to Darmstadt, before this diminished event eventually took
place. The International PEN vice presidents Nadine Gordimer, Arthur
Miller, and Leopold Senghor chose not to come to Croatia after all. The
two remaining prominent authors present, George Konrad of Budapest
and Alain Finkielkraut of Paris, were used by the Croatian PEN politi–
cians for their own publicity purposes. Finkielkraut, the French philoso–
pher who has helped the Croatian cause back home, was the unchal–
lenged hero of the Croatian exiled intelligentsia and the local fan club. He
even accepted, together with the Italian writer Grytzko Mascioni and the
British writer Francis King, the Dubovica Literary Prize, handed over to
him by Dr. Franjo Tudjman, President of Croatia and a PEN member.
Finkielkraut did not question Tudjman about his anti-Semitic publica–
tions, but before the ceremony he did briefly ask the president to explain
the current military clashes between the Croatians and their so-called al–
lies, the Bosnian Muslims. Finkielkraut's question was short and to the
point; Tudjman's answer very lengthy and evasive.
International PEN President George Konrad came to the congress
reluctantly and obviously felt uneasy. Over the weeks before the gather–
ing, he had tried hard to influence the Croatian organizers to cancel the
congress by themselves - stressing the potential danger for
all
participants
in a "war territory." But the Croatian PEN chapter insisted on abiding
by
the decision made by International PEN in 1992. The motto of the con-
