KarlSchembri

His first published work appeared in 1997, when he contributed the poem “Roadblock” to the self-published anthology Frekwenzi ta’ Spirti fis-Sakra (Frequencies of Drunken Spirits). Next came the short story collection Taħt il-Kappa tax-Xemx (Under the Sun, Minima) in 2002, which placed Schembri in the roster of alternative literary voices gathered under the umbrella of the short-lived but deeply influential micro-publisher Minima. But it was the release of his debut novel Il-Manifest tal-Killer (Choppy Books, 2006) which secured his position as a notable and urgent literary voice, even leading veteran author Mario Azzopardi to describe it as the first truly “anarchist” work of Maltese literature. Telling the story of a group of young misfits banding together to push back against the dominant political narrative through subversive action, the novel fictionalises into satire the real-life strands of political corruption, moral hypocrisy and institutional complacency which Schembri often found himself tackling during his years as a journalist for national media.

Schembri’s professional life would continue to expand and evolve – he branched out into international journalism, and relocated from Malta in 2009 to work as a journalist with a Palestinian news agency in occupied Palestine, before assuming media-adjacent roles in humanitarian institutions such as Oxfam, Save the Children and the Norwegian Refugee Council. His poetry and short fiction would go on to appear in various anthologies, both local and international. And yet, the legacy of Il-Manifest tal-Killer continues to tower over Schembri’s literary reputation, as evidenced by it being privy to a rare phenomenon in Maltese publishing: a freshly reissued edition arriving in 2020 from the prestigious Merlin Publishers, no less. Schembri claims the novel has now come “full circle”, confirming that Malta’s institutionally stagnant political system remains ripe for satire with the same tools he employed back in 2006, despite apparent – and largely cosmetic – changes having occurred on the scene since.

But 2020 was as much about experimentation as it was about revisitation. Also for Merlin Publishers, Schembri collaborated with illustrator Alice Samuel for the picture book for children - It-tifel li salva d-dinja (The boy who saved the world, Merlin Publishers, 2020)– which speaks to Schembri's versatility as an author, capable of transforming a ‘napkin idea’ originally sketched at a Cairo cafe back in 2013 into a universal and slyly complex story about a lonely boy forging an imaginary friendship with the sun. The Lulu Diaries (Ede Books, 2020) adds a further kink to Schembri's recent publication history, being a poetry book inspired by a kitten which accidentally dropped into the author’s life while he was living in Gaza in 2012.

Karl Schembri is now based in Amman, Jordan, where he lives with wife Simine, his dog Mitti and cats Munzer and Mario.