September, 2003, logging in Sami area
Aspart of our Book Campaign, these authors acted as ambassadors for theprotection of the worlds' last ancient forests and have pledged toprint their next books on 'ancient forest friendly' paper.
"I cannot keep wondering how much pulpof paper has my book swallowed, how many trees have been logged, howmuch destruction or natural habitat has my modest endeavour caused,"says Javier Moro. "It is our duty as writers to protect our books frombeing accomplices in nature's holocaust."
The authors toured some of Finland's most threatened ancient forests innorthern Lapland, situated about 300 kilometres north of the ArcticCircle. They visited important ancient forests that are some of thelast untouched forests and crucial to the traditional livelihoods ofthe indigenous Sámi reindeer herders. They also witnessed ancientforests areas that have recently been logged by the Finnish Statelogging company, Metsähallitus. The authors offered their support tothe demands of Sámi reindeer herders and environmental groups thatthese unique areas be set aside from logging and not be pulped to makepaper products.
This experience also reaffirmed the authors' commitments to get theirnext books on ancient forest friendly paper. In fact, Niccolo Ammanitiwas so inspired while spending time in these fragile ancient forests hecalled his publisher (while still in the forest!) and convinced him toprint his next book on recycled paper.
Read about the authors and some stories that they were inspired to write after their visit to the Ancient Forests of Finland.
Lydia Rood - Netherlands
Lydia Rood was born in Velp, the Netherlands in 1957. She is a trainedjournalist with several years of newspaper experience (Volkskrant) andis currently writing freelance for magazines, radio and television,however, her main profession is writing novels.
Her debut was in 1982, a children's book called 'Een geheim pad naargisteren' (A Secret Path To Yesterday). She has received awards for herchildren's books. Apart from children's books, she writes novels,thrillers and (erotic) short stories. Important themes in her books arefreedom, friendship and adventure.
Lydia has always been very socially engaged and an activist againstinjustice, for example she took part in the demonstration in Tahitiagainst French nuclear testing in Mururoa in 1995. Lydia lives inMarken, the Netherlands, with her daughter.
Javier Moro - Spain
Read "The Writer's Role" by Javier Moro
Javier Moro was born in Madrid in 1955. He is a writer,journalist, cinema producer and screenwriter. He is following the pathdefined by his uncle, Dominique Lapierre (author of 'City of Joy' andthe famous 'Freedom at Midnight'). Javier has discovereddifferent facets of Indian ethos and culture, while dwelling onIndia-relevant themes. His most recent book is 'Indian Passion',a historic novel set in India at the end of the British Raj, based on atrue story.
His other books all have a strong social or environmental angle andinclude: the story of Brazilian leader Chico Mendes, 'Freedom atMidnight', the story of a quadriplegic who conquered his disability 'Elpie de jaipur', the true story of 2 Tibetan nuns who fled Lhasa insearch for freedom in India, 'The mountains of the Buddha' and thestory of the world's worst industrial disaster 'Five past midnight inBhopal'. To write this book he lived in Bhopal for sixmonths. He combed the city, interviewing laborers and othersassociated with the Union Carbide. He conducted 256 interviewsall over the world, finding the people who could provide him a widerperspective of events.
Moro is also a freelancer journalist with published articles in allmajor Spanish newspapers and magazines (El País or El Mundo). Inaddition, Moro has co-produced and wrote screenplays for the movies'Valentina' and 'Cronica del alba' and has been involved in cinema andTV projects in the United States in collaboration with directors likeRidley Scott.
Ken Finn - UK
Read "Pulp Friction" by Ken Finn
Ken Finn grew up in 60's suburban Walton-on-Thames. He left school at15 with no qualifications and answered the call of the 'cool', joiningLondon's new wave of working class heroes of fashion. As a successfulhairdresser his material ambitions, sports cars and a country cottagecame quickly but their shine was short lived. Instead he found thewonder of the natural world in his rural surroundings. He is deeplypassionate about what's happening to our world, its wildlife and wildplaces.
Ken has recently published his first book, 'My Journey with aremarkable tree' which documents his search for the fabled Spirit Treesof Cambodia. It is a journey that lays bare what's happening to theforests, wildlife and people of Cambodia and how that affects us.
Ken witnesses the destruction of spirit trees and forest vital for away of life for indigenous people, by illegal loggers. He follows atree's path from the forest, through the wood mill and processing plantand onto the shop floor as garden furniture for our homes. Along theway he witnesses first hand the systematic and thoughtless destructionof ancient forests for immediate economic gain, and the operations of acorrupt regime intent on turning diversity into monoculture, and forestinto chipboard for quick profit.
Ken's book is printed on a 30 percent Forest Stewardship Council™ certified paper.
Niccolò Ammaniti - Italy
Read Niccolò's piece inspired by the Finnish forests.
Niccolò Ammaniti was born in Rome in 1966. He studied biology atuniversity but left before completing the degree. To make a bitof cash he bred fish. University and fish breeding were the main themesof his debut in 1994 with the novel 'Branchie' (Editrice Ediesse,subsequently Einaudi, 1997). In 1995 he published the essay 'Nelnome del figlio', written together with his father Massimo. Further success came a year later with the publication of 'Fango'(Mondadori). A collection of stories of varying styles (noir,horror, comedy) about the city of Rome. A film, starring MonicaBellucci and entitled 'L'ultimo capodanno dell'umanità' was made basedon the first story. His short stories have appeared in theanthologies 'Gioventù cannibale' (Einaudi, 1966) and 'Tutti i denti delmostro sono perfetti' (Mondadori, 1997). The great rural novel"Ti prendo e ti porto via" (Mondadori) is from 1999. In 2001 hewrote a script for an American production 'Gone Bad'-a sentimentalsplatter comedy in digital animation, about a group of zombies in aNevada Village.
In 2001 Einaudi published 'I'm Not Scared' (Io Non Ho Paura). This book has been Ammaniti's biggest success so far. 'I'm Not Scared'has been on the best-seller list in Italy since its release in April2001 and has won many literary awards. In fact, at thirty-four,Niccolò Ammaniti is the youngest-ever author to win the prestigiousViareggio-Rèpaci prize.
A film based on the novel 'I'm Not Scared' has been made, directed byGabriele Salvatores, the Academy-award winning director ofMediterraneo. It premiered at the Berlin Film Festival inFebruary 2003, and is already a smash hit in Italy. His bookshave been translated into English, French, German, Spanish, Greek andRussian.
Robin Valtiala - Finland
Robin Valtiala was born in 1967 in Kauniainen, Finland. Robin haspublished several poetry and short prose in Finnish and Swedishincluding 'Bakfönster' (Boklaget 1991) and 'Fingerfärg' (Schildts1997). Söderströms published his first novel 'Långa barn skaspela gamla' about the energetic youth and the mechanisms in societyworking to suppress these expressions in 2003. Valtiala has alsowritten travel books about Latin America and his next book on Mexicowill be published in 2006.
"All my life I have liked and needed nature for my inspiration. For me,it's hard to understand the use of the word "democracy" nowadays.Business people are said to represent liberty just because they aregood at making money and at the same time they act in ways that steerfar from public opinion, supported by politicians, and often cooperatewith dictators. A person who thinks the right to make money should berestricted, if it can solve environmental and social problems, thisperson is called a 'communist'. A person who protests is easily called'terrorist'. When I hear this last argument, I think to myself thatwithout any illegal protest my country would among other things stillbe ruled by an absolute monarch.
How ridiculous the power of the so named experts can be, I realizedthis notion a couple of years ago, when I took part in a publicdiscussion about the forest where I live in Espoo. The city of Espoohad hired a consultant who claimed that it's necessary to cut downtrees in order to protect biodiversity. A biologist in the audiencepointed out it's quite the opposite, which befell on deaf ears.
I enjoy the absolute freedom I have in my literary world. The daythere's nothing around you that is not artificially made, I wonder whatliterature will be like."
Karel Verleyen - Flemish Belgium
Karel Verleyen (1938) is very well educated; after achieving histeacher's degree he studied law and then went on to pursue severaladditional post-academic degrees. This set the stage for Karel leadinga very diverse and colourful professional life in which education,journalism and writing is the most important components. For 12 yearsKarel was acting chief editor of TOP, a magazine for teenagers. He wenton to be the chief editor for the newspaper Het Volk and chief editorof UIT-Magazine (tourism magazine) en Wintersport Magazine.
Since 1996 Karel has dedicated his time completely to writing books. Hestarted his career writing historical adventurous stories but hasexpanded his repertoire to include stories influenced by his owntravel-experiences and publications addressing environment problems,misuse of modern technology and so forth. He also actively translatesbooks from French, German, English, Italian and Spanish intoDutch. Karel Verleyen has received many acclaims for his work inBelgium, the Netherlands and other countries as many of his books havebeen translated into different languages.
Verleyen's strength as a writer is that he is able to write about verycomplex matters such as racism, globalisation and exploitation to avery young audience. He loves to communicate to children andteenagers about his books and listens to their opinion. Daily hereceives a lot of e-mails, letters and even phone calls from hisreaders and engages in discussions with them about the themes in hiswork. He is startled when he is called a famous and successfulFlemish writer. Because only one thing matters to him: that childrenand teenagers love to read and are inspired by his stories, books andpoems.
Aurélie Filipetti - France
Read "All this for paper pulp" inspired by the Finnish forests
Aurélie Filippetti was born in 1973 in Lorraine in east of France andis of Italian decent. Her first novel 'Les derniers jours de laclasse Ouvrière' (The Lasts Days of the Labour Class) published byStock in 2003 and has been subsequently translated in severallanguages. In 2003, Aurélie wrote the script for the theaterproduction 'Fragments d'humanité'. Her second novel is due to belaunched at the end of 2005.
Aurélie is also a delegate of the French Green party for the Parismunicipality and acted as the technical adviser for the EnvironmentalMinister, Yves Cochet, from 2001 to 2002.