| China had doubled its participation in terms of space rental from the previous year, the fair's spokesman Thomas Pinkus told me, and Japan was up 40%. India had a record number of 150 publishers participating though the government, by way of the National Book Trust, had rented the bulk of 1,400 sq metres. More than 60 Indian writers were participating, the who's who of Indian books, from Mahashweta Devi to Shobhaa De and U R Ananthamurthy to Javed Akhtar, never mind English language authors like Shashi Tharoor and Amitav Ghosh, who are regular book fair trawlers. But why India? "Because you can't get away from it," Pinkus said. "You open the papers or go into the Internet and there are India stories everywhere," like a well-rehearsed actor he sighed. "I go home and my nephews and nieces talk about Bollywood movies." Inevitably, he touched upon the India-China comparison. "India's got democracy. That means the freedom to say what you want. This translates into quality writing and better books. All publishing i n China is state-controlled." |
| Although actively supported by Germany's foreign ministry and the Goethe Institute, the Frankfurt Book Fair is only nominally a public-private enterprise. It is a private company owned by the German publishers and booksellers' association. It is answerable to shareholders and is obliged to show a decent profit. In fact, it has become so well-established a brand that it is keen to take over the running book fairs in other countries. One success has been managing South Africa's book fair in Cape Town. A notable failure this year was its attempt to take over the London Book Fair. The London fair has been in trouble ever since its move from a central location to distant Docklands. Frankfurt stepped in with the promise of relocating it to Kensington. But the bid collapsed when differences erupted between the Frankfurt Book Fair and the exhibition space owners. |
| Growth has come about because of aggressive salesmanship and thinking up some brilliant new ideas. One of the Frankfurt Book Fair's original and hugely successful schemes was to create an exclusive area for literary agents to trade in book copyrights. Space is available cheaply""small agents can set up tables in stalls measuring as little as 4 sq metres for as little as ¤188 (about Rs 11,000). Another success has been to coax the best and most varied literary talent in the world to attend. This year's big stars, apart from the Indian contingent, included Nobel Prize winners Gunter Grass, Imre Kertesz and Gao Xinjiang; thriller writers Ken Follett and Donna Leon; and award-winning film directors Luc Besson, Mira Nair and Atom Egoyan. (The fair also runs a film festival.) |
| New media is being pumped up by encouraging bloggers to publish their daily impressions on the book fair's website. Do-gooding schemes such as a literary campaign ("LitCam" for short) that bring campaigners from four continents together under the aegis of Shashi Tharoor were in motion. "In Germany alone," read the pained press release, "there are 4 million unable to read... worldwide this figure reaches more than 700 million." |
| The book fair has one of the best-appointed and efficient press rooms I have ever seen, with row upon row of high-speed laptops and desktops, soundproof recording booths and a resourceful staff. But it opens at 9.30 in the morning and closes sharp at 6.30 pm, no questions asked. Finding a 24X7 Internet cafe or late night wi-fi facilities to uplink copy or video clips was a nightmare. Despite India being the honoured country, someone forgot that IST runs four hours ahead. |
Top Section
Explore Business Standard