Per Wästberg

Wästberg, who, as a luminary of Amnesty International and a former president of International PEN – as well as being a member of the Nobel Prize for Literature committee – possesses his own impeccable do-gooding credentials, has rescued a beguiling soul from oblivion while subtly reminding readers.

The novel of Anders Sparrman written by Per Wästberg shows that the subject of this poetic biographical novel, was a Swedish natural scientist, the first zoologist to study, for example, the African rhino. Even by the time he died, in 1820, no one had traveled further south. But as Per Wästberg reveals in a touching postscript, Sparrman's life, despite laudable scientific discovery and ground breaking cartography, remained obscure.[2]

Wästberg has campaigned extensively for human rights. He was President of the PEN International from 1979 until 1986 and founder of the Swedish section of Amnesty International (1963). In connection with this, he was involved in the anti-colonial movement. He was especially active in the struggle against Apartheid in South Africa, where he became a close friend of Nadine Gordimer.

He was expelled by the government in Rhodesia in 1959, and after publication of his anti-Apartheid book På svarta listan (On the Black List) in 1960, he was banned from entering both Rhodesia and South Africa. He returned to South Africa only in 1990, after the release from jail of Nelson Mandela.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Per Wästberg.

• Curriculum Vitae from the Nobel Prize Committee
• Interview and profile first published in Prospect magazine
• PEN International