The PEN Charter

The PEN Charter, to which all members of Scottish PEN subscribe, is based on resolutions passed at its International Congresses and may be summarized as follows:

PEN affirms that:

1. Literature knows no frontiers and must remain common currency among people in spite of political or international upheavals.
2. In all circumstances, and particularly in time of war, works of art, the patrimony of humanity at large, should be left untouched by national or political passion.
3. Members of PEN should at all times use what influence they have in favour of good understanding and mutual respect between nations; they pledge themselves to do their utmost to dispel race, class and national hatreds, and to champion the ideal of one humanity living in peace in one world.
4. PEN stands for the principle of unhampered transmission of thought within each nation and between all nations, and members pledge themselves to oppose any form of suppression of freedom of expression in the country and community to which they belong, as well as throughout the world wherever this is possible. PEN declares for a free press and opposes arbitrary censorship in time of peace. It believes that the necessary advance of the world towards a more highly organized political and economic order renders a free criticism of governments, administrations and institutions imperative. And since freedom implies voluntary restraint, members pledge themselves to oppose such evils of a free press as mendacious publication, deliberate falsehood and distortion of facts for political and personal ends.

Scottish PEN also subscribes to the principles outlined in the PEN International Women’s Manifesto, which outlines women’s rights to have free speech, freedom from violence, access to education, the right to roam physically, socially and intellectually, and equality and parity before the law and in pay.

The full manifesto can be read here:

Read the Women’s Manifesto