Zaragoza (EFE) in addition to comics, maps or newspapers, among others. All of this is what can be found at the XVII Zaragoza Old and Antique Book Fair.
From the board at street level where you can find recent editions of Anagrama, Tusquets or Siruela, to name a few of the innumerable publishers that populate the national scene, to getting into the booth and rummaging through the shelves on its interior walls. That’s what distinguishes avid readers looking for that desired second-hand book, either because it’s out of print or finding it at a cheaper price, from bibliophiles.
The Aragonese bibliophile José Luis Melero is one of the first to place himself in front of the still-closed shutters of the booths, waiting to be able to discover on the first day some new jewel to add to his collection of more than 35,000 copies, some title that he could have found. escape or an unusual edition.
Books for rich and poor
“Here there are accessible books for poor or rich bibliophiles,” he points out to Efe while waiting to start investigating because he is clear that inside the booth is where “very important books” are found.
Accustomed to visiting different old and antique book fairs, he qualifies the event in the Aragonese capital, which will be open to the public in Plaza de Aragón from today, March 23, to Sunday, April 9, as a “good fair and suitable for Zaragoza”.
As a regular visitor since the first edition began, Melero explains that throughout these seventeen editions, interesting books have been purchased in Zaragoza, such as first editions by Federico García Lorca, Antonio Machado or Juan Ramón Jiménez, but also other relevant ones for historians such as “an edition of the Fueros de Aragón from the 16th or 17th century”.
“Here you can find everything,” says Melero vehemently, while highlighting the presence of important professionals from abroad such as the García Prieto bookstore in Madrid or the Valencians Russafa and Toni, up to a total of eleven exhibitors.
Regarding his best acquisition at this fair of the innumerable ones he has held, Melero thinks for a moment and does not hesitate to point out that it was Mariano Peralta’s dictionary of Aragonese “an edition from 1830 or so that is a very good piece”. He confesses that in this case they called him to warn him that he had just arrived.
Elbows fair and square
Although it is in a metaphorical way, Melero acknowledges that there may be nudges to review the shelf in which it is intuited that there may be a desired piece, but “always with education and in a good fight.”
Regarding the books that can be found at the fair, accessible to all budgets, he makes it clear that “in the flea market you can find bargains, not here” because it is the booksellers who, “based on their knowledge and experience”, set the price valued and gives as a numerical example that “here a book can be worth around a hundred, but not twenty or a thousand”.
This seventeenth edition was opened with the traditional proclamation by the professor at the University of Zaragoza Manuel José Pedraza Gracia, professor in the Department of Documentation Sciences and History of Science, who explained to EFE that what he had written is “the least proclamation of all proclamations. Heterodox”.
“I have done it that way because my body asked me to. I have made a story that is not fiction come true because everything I tell has happened or could have happened. It is a tribute to my platonic love Juana Millán ”, she has commented.
Pedraza is the author of books such as ‘Readers and readings in Zaragoza (1501-1521)’, ‘Price and value of the old book’, ‘Appraisal, valuation and trade of the old book’, ‘Documents for reading the history of the book of Zaragoza ‘ or ‘The organized knowledge of a man from Trent. The library of Pedro de Frago, bishop of Huesca in 1584’. In addition, he was director of the course ‘Valuation and appraisal of the old book’, in the summer courses of the University of Zaragoza, held in Jaca, as well as a member of the scientific committee of the V International Congress on Medieval and Modern Books.
Bookstores in Zaragoza, Huesca, Navarra, Vitoria, Valencia and Madrid
The fair will be open to the public from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. and from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. The participating bookstores are Luces de Bohemia and Libros del Rescate, from Zaragoza; Prologue, by Gurrea de Gállego (Huesca); Books with History, by Urroz Villa (Navarra); Sekmet, from Vitoria; Russafa, Asilo del Libro and Altossal, from Valencia, and García Prieto, Hallazgo and Marcos Ortiz, from Madrid.
In addition to volumes with historical importance, books on narrative, science fiction, philosophy, history, the Civil War, cooking, and countless other topics are selected, making up a complete and interesting offer.
You can also find collector’s treasures such as maps, engravings, posters, postcards, sticker albums, comics or manuscripts.
