The New Delhi World Book Fair is back and entering the 40th year since its foundation in 1972. Bibliophiles in the city can expect this year’s fair to be bigger and better than before. This year’s theme is “POINT-OF-VIEW: An International Rights Exhibition of Books on Indian Cinema”, as the fair also celebrates 100 years of Indian Cinema in 2013. Apart from innumerable book stalls, there will also be conferences, programmes and talks.
Autobiographies and tomes on the stalwarts of Indian cinema will be on display, and an exclusively designed hall will display over a 1000 books related to cinema including screenplays of old classics, memoirs of filmmakers and encyclopaedias of cinema, including books on Satyajit Ray, Balraj Sahani and Dada Sahab Phalke.
There will also be books on the impact of regional cinema on society and culture. Bollywood actors are slated to visit and participate in workshops on literature and cinema. Besides actors and film personalities, the fair will also see a gathering of film critics and other media personalities. While Bollywood is certainly a much more vast presence, NBT has been careful to include and present books on regional cinemas too.
Held biannually and established by the National Book Trust, the New Delhi World Book Fair is an absolute treat for booklovers. It acts like a platform to bring together professionals, intellectuals and academicians and serves as a valuable interface between authors, publishers, booksellers and readers. Both global and Indian players in publishing, copyright, translations and co-publication trade can use this platform to connect with each other as well as their consumers.
The New Delhi World Book Fair has seen increasingly growing participation and gathering every year, and has firmly established the reputation of being the biggest publishing event in the Afro-Asian region with a veritable who’s who from publishing industries not just within India but from all over the world.
New Delhi World Book Fair; February 25 to March 4; Pragati Maidan, New Delhi
Bottomline:a valuable interface between authors, publishers, booksellers and readers.
