Isabel Allende: New Honorary Member of PEN Chile

PEN Writers Circle member – Isabel Allende

PEN Chile is pleased to announce that author Isabel Allende is joining the Center as an honorary member. The author will be formally received during a virtual ceremony today, 18 August 2021, at 7pm local time. The event will be broadcast on PEN Chile's official social media channels.

"PEN Chile is immensely proud to have Isabel Allende as an honorary member. She is the Chilean writer who has the world greatest recognition for her literary work; she has received various international honours and awards, but more importantly, her voice influences and lives in the hearts of millions of people around the world. The promotion of literature, and the inclusion and defense of human rights, including women´s rights, are values that are fundamental to her work as a writer, and which are at the heart of PEN International and PEN Chile," said Germán Rojas, President of the PEN Centre.

Isabel Allende began her career in 1967 as a journalist, publishing in Chilean media such as Mampato and Paula magazine, where she made her voice known thanks to her feminist column "Civilice a su troglodita" (Civilise your troglodyte). However, the 1973 military coup put a stop to her activities and, in 1975, she went into exile alongside her family in Venezuela, where she lived until 1988.

His first novel, La Casa de los Espíritus (The House of the Spirits, 1982), became a worldwide publishing phenomenon. Since that milestone, Isabel Allende has reflected her personal life, exile, pains, joys, loves, memories and nostalgia in 25 books of fiction and non-fiction, published in 35 languages, and selling 67 million copies. Among the many awards received are the Hispanic Heritage Award (1996), the National Prize for Literature (2010) and the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2014), awarded by Barak Obama in the United States, where she currently lives.