Lifestyle

Frankfurt Book Fair 14.-18.10.2005 (preview)

Guest of Honor, Indonesia


Exhibition Center Frankfurt (Source: Ekkehard Boldt)
USPA NEWS - “17,000 Islands of Imagination“. That is the motto for the presentation by Indonesia, this year's Guest of Honor at the Frankfurt Book Fair. With a population of 250 million, Indonesia is an exciting market for the international book industry. There are at least 1,400 publishing companies in the ...
...country, producing almost 20,000 titles each year and generating a turnover of about 450 million euros. Half of the new releases are translations, mostly from English, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese and Korean. Indonesia´s own literature, on the other hand, has only rarely found its way into foreign book markets. The sales of licenses abroad are worth just 130,000 euros each year. The translation grant programmer I-Lit (www.indonesiafbf.com), which will be launched by Indonesia´s Ministry of Education and Culture as part of the Guest of Honor appearance, should change this situation.
At a press conference at the Haus des Buches (Frankfurt), this year´s Guest of Honor gave a detailed preview of its literary and cultural program. “With its role as Guest of Honor at the 2015 Frankfurt Book Fair, Indonesia has the opportunity to take a first tentative step on the international literary stage“, explains Goenawan Mohamad, Chairman of the Guest of Honor Committee.
“Our country is not very well known in Europe, and we´d like open the door now to give people here a glimpse of our multifaceted archipelago. We welcome you all ““ not just as tourists, but especially as discoverers.“
Tobias Voss, Vice President International Markets Frankfurt Book Fair:
Some 64 per cent of exhibitors at the Frankfurt Book Fair come from outside Germany. For five days in October, more than 100 nationalities share this single space. The result is a global city of ideas! That strong international network of publishing professionals creates a special Frankfurt feeling. It is a feeling we want to share across the world, all year round. With more than 40 international activities and 4 permanent offices abroad, the Frankfurt Book Fair´s team goes on a world tour every year. Why? Because intimate knowledge of publishing markets worldwide is at the core of what we do, and it underpins the things we support.
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