Canadian media executive Richard Stursberg elected PEN Canada President at 2017 AGM

Richard Stursberg (CNW Group/PEN Canada) Facebook Twitter Pinterest

TORONTO, June 7, 2017 /CNW/ - Canadian media executive Richard Stursberg has been elected the new President of PEN Canada. Stursberg, who succeeds novelist and academic Randy Boyagoda, was voted in at PEN Canada's 2017 Annual General Meeting at the Arts and Letters Club of Toronto, June 6.

"I am thrilled," said Stursberg. "I look forward to furthering the work of this extremely important organization."

Stursberg has shaped the Canadian communications landscape in both private and public sectors, serving as Executive Director of Telefilm Canada, Chairman of the Canadian Television Fund, President of Starchoice and Cancom (now Shaw Direct), President of the Canadian Cable Television Association, and Assistant Deputy Minister of Culture and Broadcasting for the Government of Canada.

In October 2004, Stursberg was appointed Executive Vice President of English Services at the CBC where he led both CBC radio and TV to their largest audiences in a generation. In 2012, Stursberg published The Tower of Babble, a memoir of his time at the CBC, which was named one of the best books of the year by the Globe and Mail. Born in London, England and raised in New York City, Stursberg is the son of Canadian writer and broadcaster Peter Stursberg.

A director of PEN Canada since 2015, Stursberg was instrumental in launching the PEN Canada/Ken Filkow Prize, which celebrates Canadians who work to defend freedom of expression.

PEN Canada is a nonpartisan organization of writers that works with others to defend freedom of expression as a basic human right at home and abroad. PEN Canada promotes literature, fights censorship, helps free persecuted writers from prison, and assists writers living in exile in Canada. www.pencanada.ca

Our thanks to CNW Group for sponsoring this announcement.

SOURCE PEN Canada

For further information: Amy Smith, PEN Canada, asmith@pencanada.ca, 416-703-8448 ext. 2223