With its gaze firmly fixed on the 2022 edition of this event, at which Spain will be the Guest of Honour, our country is attending the 2020 Frankfurt Book Fair from 14 to 18 October, the largest commercial event in the publishing sector anywhere in the world. Publishers, literary agents, writers and professionals from the book sector gather for this event, where 80% of all copyright contracts in the world are signed each year.
The Spanish Ministry of Culture and Sport, via the Directorate-General of Books and the Promotion of Reading, the Spanish Cultural Action Agency (Spanish acronym: AC/E) and the Federation of Spanish Publishers' Guilds (Spanish acronym: FGEE) have prepared a comprehensive programme with both authors and professionals for this year’s event, which combines face-to-face actions with numerous virtual activities. Entitled Spain, the way of books, the main goal for Spain’s programme at this year’s edition of the Frankfurt Book Fair is to demonstrate the strength of our publishing sector to the world: both in terms of the vast amount of literary content in the various languages of Spain and the economic strength and ability to bounce back of the book sector. A general overview of the Spanish publishing industry accompanies the entire programme in order to generate new business opportunities.
The value of the Spanish publishing sector for culture, society, the economy and jobs is unquestionable: in 2019 (pre-COVID), the publishing industry was worth 2.42 billion euros, up 2.4% on the previous year. Over 82,300 books were published and more than 162 million paper copies (of the 230 million published) were sold in Spain during 2019, according to the results from a report entitled Domestic Trade in Books in Spain 2019 that was published in September. In turn, exports from the publishing sector exceeded 420 million euros in 2018, according to data from the Federation of Publishers.
Literary and professional activities
Spain’s programme for the event will be streamed live from the
spainfrankfurt2022.com website, which visitors can access for free after registering to do so, and will use the
#MuchosLibrosPorDescubrir hashtag so that both professionals and those interested in Spanish literature can follow the talks, leave comments and discover more about this important aspect of culture. These literary meetings will be carefully broadcast live with supporting images and audio-visual resources interspersed between them to offer as complete an experience as possible.
The literary programme will include writers’ panels and talks on a variety of topics. At the Ellas Escriben [Women Write] panel, such female authors as Laura Freixas, Elena Medel and Sara Mesa will examine how women writers are breaking the glass ceiling in literature. In turn, Irene Solá and Sergio del Molino, will debate the rural exodus under a theme of Escrito en la Tierra [Written on the Ground]. There will also be panels dedicated to Benito Pérez Galdós, Miguel Delibes and Concepción Arenal to celebrate their respective centenaries.
Spanish authors, Daniel Innerarity and Marina Perezagua, will also take part in BookfestDigital, a 16-hour online broadcast, while Fernando Aramburu and Rosa Ribas, both residents in Germany, will speak from the Cervantes Institute in Frankfurt about the implications of writing from a different country at BookfestCity.
To promote the book industry in partnership with libraries, bookshops, publishers and agents all over Spain, the FGEE, the Directorate-General of Books and the AC/E will organise Un recorrido por [A journey through] a selection of 10 fiction, non-fiction, children and young adult, and new voice titles with experts aimed at raising their profile among international publishers and agents. Furthermore, the Have a Look at Spain session will present the Spanish publishing sector and its trends to professionals from around the world.
Books from Spain and support for the translation of Spanish works
Due to the difficulties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the
Books from Spain portal was launched in July. This online initiative seeks to
promote the sale of rights and make up for the lack of professional events such as those in London, Bologna and Frankfurt. A total of 100 publishers are involved, each one with five titles available for sale and translation into other languages. The
Books from Spain portal already forms part of the Frankfurt Rights commercialisation platform.
This online tool is accompanied by financial aid for translations. The AC/E Financial Aid for Translation Programme, set up in 2019 specifically for the Spain Guest of Honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair project and running until 2022, has increased the amount of financial aid available this year to 400,000 euros, a rise of 40% on last year. Applications can still be submitted for this funding, which is added to a further 400,000 euros from the Ministry of Culture and Sport through the Directorate-General for Books and the Promotion of Reading. Spain aims to use this financial aid to attend Frankfurt 2022 with the highest possible number of translated titles.