World Book Day 2019: History, theme, and significance

World Book Day 2019: Books are known to be the bridge between the past and the present, and play an important role in contributing to one’s knowledge. From fiction to non-fiction and biographies to self-published ones, the range is aplenty. To celebrate the importance of literature and reading, every year April 23 is celebrated as World Book and Copyright Day.

According to the United Nations, owing to the death anniversary of Shakespeare, Cervantes Inca Garcilaso de la Vega and the birth anniversary of greats like Haldor K Laxness, Maurice Druon, Vladimir Nabokov, Josep Pla and Manuel Mejía Vallejo, the day became a natural choice for UNESCO’s General Conference in 1955.

As per UNESCO, the idea is to encourage everyone to pick up books, especially the younger lot. The day assumes more significance in present times considering that reading books has taken a backseat for many owing to information overload from other sources including digital.

The theme for this year, which is the 24th edition, is centred around celebrating literature and reading with a particular focus on enhancing and protecting indigenous languages. ‘As a vector of knowledge, books bring people together around a story and a common heritage while revealing their specificities through different cultures, identities and languages. The focus on this topic is fully in line with the celebration of the International Year of the Indigenous Languages’, mentions United Nations.

This year, the city of Sharjah has been selected as the World Book Capital for a period of one year. Named by UNESCO and international organisations representing publishers, libraries and booksellers, Sharjah has been appreciated for its ‘very innovative, comprehensive and inclusive approach with a community-focused activity programme containing creative proposals to engage the very large migrant population’.

With the slogan “Read – you are in Sharjah”, the programme focuses on six themes namely, inclusivity, reading, heritage, outreach, publishing and children.

The city, whose objective is to foster a culture of reading in the United Arab Emirates, is looking to make full use of the tag with a conference on freedom of speech, a contest for young poets, workshops for creating Braille books and tactile books as well as many events for Sharjah’s multi-ethnic population.