Rohingya crisis puts Myanmar literary festival guest writers on the spot
Boycott of next month’s Irrawaddy Literary Festival announced by one guest over Muslim minority humanitarian crisis, while another, Lonely Planet’s Tony Wheeler, accuses its patron, Aung San Suu Kyi, of not saying enough about it
The ongoing violence in Myanmar – described by the UN human rights chief as a “textbook example” of ethnic cleansing – is making some writers wary about next month’s Irrawaddy Literary Festival (ILF), particularly as festival organisers have not directly addressed the situation and Aung San Suu Kyi is the festival’s patron.
Tony Wheeler, co-founder of the Lonely Planet guidebook, says he has not booked his flights yet and is undecided about whether to attend the event scheduled for November 3-5.
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“I’m between a rock and a hard place,” Wheeler says by phone from his home in Melbourne. “If you go, you could be looked upon as ignoring the problem and trying to pretend things are normal when they are not. On the other hand, if you don’t go when you were going to go you are not confronting the problem.”
Australian children’s writer Gus Gordon has decided not to attend and will write off his airfare, which has already been paid.
“It became increasingly evident that, aside from the potential safety risks, it was the wrong thing to do. It didn’t sit well with me that I was about to go to a literary festival and speak about stories when a humanitarian crisis was happening my doorstep,” Gordon says.
