Autumn has begun! Here is a a glimpse of some fall foliage in my lane.
Over the weekend, I visited the annual book fair at Frankfurt or Frankfurt Buchmesse, as its known in German. It is a simply humungous affair in the middle of the city with around 4,000 exhibitors and more than 2,000 events, each of them concentrated around books.
There were book publishers from across the world, booksellers, stationers, newspapers, literary agents, museums and everyone else connected with the book or publishing industry. It began on 19th October, but the first two days were reserved for insiders from the industry and of course, the press. From the 21st to 23rd October, the fair opened up for everyone.
It was MASSIVE! There were 3 very large halls, each with 3 stories full of exhibitors. Pure bookish love overflowing everywhere and fellow literature lovers smiling at each other in the aisles of the halls. Each publishing house had its own huge stand - name any publisher you know; Penguin, Macmillan, Diogenes, Carlsen - each of them had their own large space there and were selling or advertising books. There were large reading corners designed at every publisher’s stand and of course, book lovers were reading peacefully at those tables.
Cloth bags and bookish discussions could be seen and heard at every corner. There was also such beautiful bookish art everywhere, designed to lure kids and fantasy lovers. There were a ton of people dressed up in truly spectacular costumes; I saw amazing versions of Jack Frost, all the characters from Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings, innumerable elves and woodland creatures. The reason for this - there was a Cosplay tournament later on the in the evening, sponsored by the book fair.
There were talks, lectures and stage performances organized in the tents directly outside the exhibition center and also all across Frankfurt city. The topics were diverse; spanning the current political crises, the future of publishing, photography & film, live musical shows for children and many performances. The locations were spectacular too - the Frankfurt art club, the old town hall or the one of the city’s many libraries. There was, of course, also a TikTok (or a BookTok) stage where live performances and literary comedies were taking place.
Spain was the guest of honour at the fair this year, which meant an immense focus on Spanish literature and translators. Last year’s guest of honour, Slovenia, handed over the role to Spain with a special key and a book from Slovenian author Drago Jančar. Superb Spanish music accompanied Spain’s author Manuel Rivas, as he took over the guest of honour role and both authors discussed the other’s work.
What I found particularly inspiring and exciting:
I discovered so many independent publishers and their authors! So if you’re into those books, the fair is definitely a must visit. Also, all the books are being sold at discounted or wholesale prices. Huge plus point!
Got to see a lot of new photographers’ work and their published portfolios. This inspires me and I could see which publishers are releasing these works. So if you’re interested in obscure topics and want to find books on those, the fair may be a great place to go to. There were publishers across disciplines and languages, so you may find a book for molecular biology in the Lithuanian language, if that’s what you’re looking for.
The stalls of foreign publishers were glorious!! Iceland’s stall had such a beautiful Scandinavian design and Latvia’s stall featured horses from the illustrations in children’s books over the years. These tiny details made the foreign stalls really special.
There were signing tents for authors to autograph their books and fans of all ages had queued up outside these tents. If you’re following an author and would like to meet him or her, this fair is a great chance to do that.
And the best part? To see kids reading. So many children of different ages, simply immersed in reading, just like we all used to be. To see these children read and enjoy a physical book was perhaps the best surprise the fair had for me.
Hope you enjoyed this brief and virtual visit to the Frankfurt Buchmesse! As always, Happy Reading!
Your friend,
Ajita
What a wonderful event! I hope that one day I will be able to go myself <3