Redacción América (EFE).- Beyond honoring the death of Shakespeare or Cervantes, April 23 is a celebration of letters and literature, also in Latin America, where Spanish reached other levels thanks to great writers such as Gabriel García Márquez, Gabriela Mistral or Jorge Luis Borges.
Some of the most important countries in the region take advantage of the event to celebrate their book fairs, boost the passion for literature, the business around this art and the promotion of reading.
Book Day, also called Language Day in Colombia, coincides with the XXXV Bogotá International Book Fair (FilBo), which has Mexico as the guest of honor and where the Caro y Cuervo Institute celebrates the work of Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra.
It is about the colloquium “El Quijiote and his presence today”, next Thursday, in which the general director of Caro y Cuervo, Medófilo Medina; the academic deputy director, Juan Manuel Espinosa, and the academics Alberto Bejarano and Alejandra Jaramillo.
To highlight the Colombian linguistic diversity, Caro y Cuervo will also hold the colloquium “El sancocho del español colombiano” at the FilBo.
The activities of Language Day in the country began last Thursday with various academic activities in schools, colleges and universities where book exchanges and recreational activities take place for the little ones, in order to encourage them to love reading since the The country’s average is very low, only 1.9 books per year.
In Argentina, Book Day is celebrated on June 15, the day on which in 1908 the National Council of Women awarded the prizes for its literary contest and installed an annual celebration that in 1924 became “Book Festival” and in 1941 “Day of the book”.
Although there are no major commemorations in the country on April 23, the date coincides with the celebration, between the end of that month and the beginning of May, of the Buenos Aires International Book Fair, one of the most important literary events in Latin America. , in which there are a large number of activities around reading and the main authors in Spanish, in one of the cities with the most bookstores per person in the world.
All in all, this Sunday the Fundación El Libro commemorates International Book Day with a raffle on its social networks for tickets to the fair, which this year is held from April 27 to May 15 with the presence of national and international authors such as Arturo Pérez-Reverte, Irene Vallejo and Ida Vitale, with Santiago de Chile as the guest city and with 40 years of Argentine democracy as the focus for some of its main activities.
UNAM flagship in Mexico
The Festival of the Book and the Rose, which is held at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) for three days, will insist this year on freedom of expression and literature as an art of resistance.
Renowned authors such as Peruvian Santiago Roncagliolo, Alfaguara prize; the Cuban Carlos Manuel Alvarez, chronicle Anagram award; the Iranian critic Deny Azimi; the Argentine illustrator Isol, and the Chilean poet Alejandro Zambra, among the most recognized foreign personalities.
“I like that it is called a party. More than a meeting of booksellers and publishers, it is a festival in which the National Autonomous University of Mexico and its coordination of cultural diffusion give prominence to the reader,” Anel Pérez, director of Literature and Promotion of Reading at the University, told EFE. UNAM.
On its fifteenth anniversary, the party took as its starting point to talk about freedom of expression the attack suffered last year by the novelist Salman Rushdie, who lost an eye attacked by a fanatic, 33 years after the author was sentenced to death for Ayatollah Khomeini, for the novel “The Satanic Verses”.
In Panama, the Cultural Center of Spain – Casal del Soldado, celebrates Book Day and Spanish Language Day starting this Friday with the continued reading of Don Quixote, with the participation of ambassadors, officials of Culture and the National Library, among others.
That same day, the Spanish ambassador, Guzmán Palacios, attended a commemorative ceremony at the University of Panama, which on Thursday also held a Cervantino Festival supported by the Spanish legation.
Brazil and Uruguay, on their national day
In other countries, such as Brazil and Uruguay, they prefer to dedicate a National Book Day to their tribute to literature, leaving aside international celebrations and highlighting some national milestone.
In Uruguay, National Book Day is celebrated on May 26, in commemoration of the Foundation of the National Library, after in 1815 the priest Dámaso Antonio Larrañaga sent a letter to the Cabildo in which he proposed to supply good books for the lack of teachers and institutions; while in Brazil it is celebrated on October 29, commemorating the transfer of the Portuguese Royal Library to Brazil, on that date in 1810.