PEN Pinter Prize 2020 with winner Linton Kwesi Johnson

Monday 12 October 2020, 19.30 - 20.30
Online, Free

Join us as British poet Linton Kwesi Johnson is presented with the PEN Pinter Prize 2020 and delivers an address, hosted by the British Library.

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The PEN Pinter Prize is awarded annually to a writer who, in the words of Harold Pinter’s Nobel Prize in Literature speech, casts an ‘unflinching, unswerving’ gaze upon the world and shows a ‘fierce intellectual determination... to define the real truth of our lives and our societies’.

Linton Kwesi Johnson was chosen by this year’s judges: The Guardian’s Associate Editor for Culture Claire Armitstead; Dialogue Books Publisher Sharmaine Lovegrove, and author Max Porter. The judges said of Johnson:

‘Linton Kwesi Johnson is a poet, reggae icon, academic and campaigner, whose impact on the cultural landscape over the last half century has been colossal and multi-generational. His political ferocity and his tireless scrutiny of history are truly Pinteresque, as is the humour with which he pursues them.’

The prize will be shared with an International Writer of Courage: a writer who is active in defence of freedom of expression, often at great risk to their own safety and liberty, selected by Linton Kwesi Johnson. The co-winner will be announced live at the event.

The PEN Pinter Prize is supported by the generosity of the Blavatnik Family Foundation and Ruth Maxted.