“Building a Union of Cultures” - The EU as the Guest of Honour in the 37th Guadalajara International Book Fair

The European Union is the Guest of Honour at the 37^th International Book Fair of Guadalajara, to be held from 25 November to 3 December 2023. The EU will be in Guadalajara with the aim of creating new areas for collaboration and strengthening its relations with Mexico and the whole of the Latin American and Caribbean region. This gathering will build upon the EU’s great wealth of cultural and linguistic diversity, on which its history and its present are based, as well as intercultural dialogue with Mexico and Latin America.

As well as being the largest book fair in Latin America and one of the largest in the world, the Guadalajara International Book Fair is an important cultural event that embraces all forms of artistic expression, cultural events and exchanges among civil society and academics. It constitutes a social and media event that attracts more than 800,000 visitors, has more than 15 million followers on its social media, and is covered by more than 2,000 media and press professionals and journalists.

The EU will participate in the Guadalajara International Book Fair under the slogan ‘Building a Union of Cultures’, which pays homage to the diversity of cultures, in the broadest sense, in the EU and the ALC, as well as their potential for uniting our different nations. The EU’s literary programme involves participation by more than 70 writers from the EU’s 27 countries and from Ukraine. These writers will reflect Europe’s cultural plurality and diversity of literary genres and styles. Contemporary and young writers, as well as graphic novelists, illustrators, and writers of literature for children and young adults, will also be represented in this literary programme. The authors have been invited to take part in round-tables and debates, public readings, poetry meetings, the presentation of European anthologies, literary dialogue, exchanges with the public, and activities relating to reading and the promotion of literature.

Activities for professionals from the publishing industry and the book sector are an essential component of the EU’s presence at the FIL: more than 50 publishers and professionals from the sector, from the 27 EU countries, will take part in a programme designed to facilitate and promote mutually enriching partnerships with the Mexican and Latin American book industry and its professionals. Together with the guest writers, musicians and artists they will form part of an extensive programme that includes musical and dance performances, a cycle of European cinema, various exhibitions of visual arts and a gastronomic programme.

In the Guadalajara International Book Fair, Greece partakes in the European Union Pavilion and will be represented by the authors Kallia Papadaki, Ersi Sotiropoulos, Nikos Chryssos, and the professor of Panteion University and author Nikos Bakounakis, as well as the President of the Spanish Society of Modern Greek Studies, Director of the Centre of Byzantine, Modern Greek and Cypriot Studies of the University of Granada, author and translator Moschos Morfakidis Filactos. It is to be noted that in the bookshop operating within the European Union Pavilion under the responsibility of the University of Guadalajara, there can be found 30 Greek books published from 2018 to 2023 and translated into Spanish along with books by the authors invited.

The national participation and Greece’s multi-dimensional presence in Guadalajara has been co-organized by the Ministry of Culture in collaboration with the main organizer of the Book Fair on the part of the EU and features, among others, events dedicated to the work of the participating authors, to the translation into Spanish of the two Anthologies of National Awards (Volume I. Short Story – Novella and Volume II. Poetry, Ministry of Culture 2020) as well as to the new publication of Ministry of Culture, “Hellenic World, 15th-19th century. Ideas, Events, Letters.”

There will also be film screenings (Medea by Pier Paolo Pasolini as part of a tribute dedicated to Maria Callas, as well as a tribute to the contemporary Greek cinema which will be a part of the program featuring the European cinema), a presentation of the Greek cultural life and, more specifically, of the Greek book production and the translation support program GreekLit. Participation in special meetings will take place such as the meeting of the EU Directors of Letters, as well as the meeting of the international translation support programs etc.

Moreover, a comprehensive digital exhibition will take place regarding the history of the Greek language under the title “The Culture of Speech. 3500 Years of History of the Greek Language” set up by the Ministry of Culture in cooperation with and the Centre for Byzantine, Modern Greek and Cypriot Studies of the University of Granada.

A.R.

TAGS: LITERATURE & BOOKS | READING GREECE