World Book Fair 2018: Focus on environment

With 'Environment and climate change' as the theme, this year's New Delhi World Book Fair will host European Union (EU) as the guest of honour country. The fair being held at Pragati Maidan, Delhi from January 6 to January 14 will highlight rich and dynamic European culture and literature. Special pavilions including themed pavilions, foreign pavilions, photo exhibition along with author's corner, workshops and many other events will be there for people.

With authors, publishers, illustrators, poets and artists from 13 EU member states and Switzerland participating, this edition promises to be a treat for its visitors. The fair also provides opportunities for collaboration between European and Indian publishers, authors and translators. Antoine Gallimard, Per Anderson, JL Morin, Laurence Boissiere are some of the 32 well-known authors, publishers and artists from EU who will be participating in this nine-day literary extravaganza. The EU pavilion will be in Hall no. 7. This edition of world fair will include panel discussions, talks, workshops, children's activities along with cultural and musical performances.

Mentioning India as one of the key partners, European Union ambassador Tomasz Kozlowski said, "Literature has the capacity to transcend borders and bring people together while raising important issues and enunciating universal truths. Through this fair, we hope that literary exchange will deepen and broaden our cultural ties."

As per the theme, special attention will be given to environmental issues like climate change, global warming, and water pollution in order to protect the environment for a better future. On this note, Kozlowski added, "The collaboration is all the more important as the theme of 'Climate change and Environment' is of high priority for both EU and India. Through the various discussions and events, we will be creating awareness amongst the general public and would be supporting individual and social action which is necessary to bring positive change."

The theme pavilion will be in Hall 7E, where experts would discuss over the ways through which environment can be saved from further deterioration. The pavilion will have an International Rights exhibition of nearly 500 titles published in English, Hindi, and other Indian languages which will cover various genres like autobiographies, memoirs. travelogues, creative literature, etc.

Along with EU members, more than forty countries including Canada, China, Spain, and United Kingdom and international agencies like UNESCO will also participate.

At the Children's pavilion (Hanger near 7H), a number of activities like seminars, storytelling sessions, workshops on creative writing will be organised by National Center for Children's Literature, a wing of NBT to promote reading habits amongst children and young adults. Well-known children authors like Dinesh Chamola will interact with children.

Some of the well-known writers, both popular and critically acclaimed like Ruskin Bond, Rakshanda Jalil, Seema Mustafa among others will engage in lively banters with visitors at the author's corner. There will be five special author's corner which includes: Reflections (Hall 11), Conversations (Hanger over the lake), International Events Corner (Hall 7A), Lekhak Manch (Hall 12-12A), and Sahitya Manch (Hall 8).

This year, nearly 800 publishers from across the country in different languages including Asamiya, Bangla, Gujarati, Hindi, Maithili, Malayalam, Marathi, Odiya, Punjabi, Sanskrit and Urdu will display books at more than 1500 stalls at the Fair. Also, CEOSpeak Publishers Forum will be included in the B2B session.

For visitors, timings will be 11 am to 8 pm for all the nine days. For entry to the book fair, tickets of denomination Rs 20 for children and Rs 30 for adults are available at Pragati Maidan gate numbers 1 and 10.

Tickets are also available online and at selected metro stations. Moreover, entry gates for the fair will be gate 1, 8A and 10.