The 18th Beijing International Book Festival kicks off

By Chen Xi Source: Global Times Published: 2020/9/6 20:57:01

Photo: Courtesy of the 18th Beijing International Book Festival Organizing Committee


After two months of preparation amid the coronavirus pandemic, the 18th Beijing International Book Festival kicked off at the capital's China National Convention Center on Saturday.

Man Xiangwei, a member of the festival's organizing committee, told the Global Times on Sunday that they started to plan the book festival in the beginning of 2020. However, after the COVID-19 outbreak at Beijing's Xinfadi wholesale market in June, pushing forward with the event became far more difficult.

Man also expressed his gratitude that the coronavirus epidemic situation in Beijing was able to be brought under control, which paved the way for the festival's successful opening. 

According to Man, the anti-pandemic measures taken at the festival are very strict. All staff members were required to take a nucleic acid test, and all visitors need to show a green health QR code, while those arriving from outside of Beijing also need to show their nucleic acid test results. 

The five-day festival has set up a total of 13 exhibition areas covering 5,100 square meters with a wide range of topics including the Publishing International Exchange Trade Show, Digital Publishing Experience Exhibition, Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games Exhibition and Popular Science Fiction Publishing and Cultural Creation Exhibition.

Chinese publishing houses will carry out communication projects with seven world-renowned publishing houses such as multinational conglomerate Penguin Random House, Elsevier from the Netherlands and the Springer Group from Germany.

The game publishing unit of the Digital Publishing Experience Exhibition is being hosted by two representative companies Tencent Games and Perfect World Games. 

The exhibition showcases gaming experiences that support 8K resolution high-end displays as well as some cutting-edge technologies including 5G technology and frontier exploration in the field of e-sports.

Some cultural and creative products such as those themed on sci-fi writer Liu Cixin's works are also on display at the Popular Science Fiction Publishing and Cultural Creation Exhibition.

Considering some people may not be able to participate in the event, the exhibitions are being presented for the first time online as well as offline. 

One of the most eye-catching parts of the book festival, Man said, is "meeting a bookstore, 24-hour voice wonders," for which the committee invited 48 celebrities to tell their story alongside 48 bookstores in Beijing. Audio recordings of the events will be available through many audio book apps in China. 

Man pointed out that many book shops have had to close down due to the coronavirus. The festival hopes that people will learn more about the bookshops in Beijing through the introduction of these celebrities, which might help boost sales.

Currently, more than 100 book shops are cooperating with Chinese food delivery service Meituan to deliver books within 30 minutes, which has helped relieve pressure on bookstores, according to reports.



Posted in: BOOKS

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