Czech Republic featured as the main guest at the ongoing Karlsruhe book fair
Czech Republic – supported by its culture ministry – is represented by selected writers (P. Borkovec, R. Denemarková, M. Pilátová and J. Topol) who will present their work at author reading nights. Aside from this, an extensive exhibition dedicated to contemporary Czech books is also planned.
The exhibition, prepared by the Czech Centre Berlin in cooperation with the Czech Ministry of Culture, presents contemporary Czech book production in its widest scope. On display are various guides, handbooks, maps or textbooks as well as fiction acclaimed not only because of its textual qualities but also for its visually pleasing covers, typesetting and illustration.
The exposition encompasses five hundred books published in the Czech Republic with an emphasis on recent production. For an easier overview, the titles have been divided into twelve topic and genre-based sections: Children‘ Literature, Belles-Lettres (poetry, prose, essay), Non-Fiction, Czech Language, Graphic Novels, Guides + Sights, Maps, History, Theatre, Photography, Music, Visual Art + Architecture.
Other sections include foreign translations of Czech literature, an overview of current Czech magazine publishing, titles awarded in this year’s Most Beautiful Czech Books prize and the edition Tschechische Bibliothek containing 33 volumes. Between 1999 and 2007, the edition presented the essential works of Czech literature of the last century to the German reader.
Twenty-five Czech publishers provided their titles for the exhibition including large publishing houses and small-scale publishers whose production does not surpass ten to twenty books per year including Argo, Baobab, Divadelní ústav (Theatre Institute), Eminent, Filosofia, Fra, Fraus, Host, Kant, Karolinum, Kartografie Praha, Labyrint, Lipnik, Meander, Mladá fronta, Moravská galerie v Brně (The Moravian Gallery in Brno), Moravské zemské muzeum (Moravian Land Museum), Národní památkový ústav (The National Institute for the Protection and Conservation of Monuments and Sites of the Czech Republic), Petrkov, Pulchra, Slovart, Talpress, Torst, UPM and Větrné mlýny.
Radim Kopáč
Department of Arts and Libraries, Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic
