Calling all bookworms: Malta Book Festival starts tomorrow

This year’s edition of the Malta Book Festival will be open to the public as of tomorrow and will run until 13 November, education minister Evarist Bartolo and the executive chairman of the National Book Council Mark Camilleri announced today.

The festival, which will be held at the Mediterranean Conference Centre in Valletta, will include several conferences on a wide variety of topics, book launches and presentations, meetings with the authors, and an exhibition on book-binding, with a number of internationally renown authors participating in conferences and in events dedicated to their lives and work, according to a statement by the ministry of education.

Virtually all local publishers, major bookshops and book distributors, public entities and NGOs will participate in the festival PHOTO: Omar Camilleri/DOI

An event is also being organised in honour of the life and work poetess Maria Grech Ganado, who won last year’s ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’. 

The ministry said that the participants for this year include virtually all local publishers, major bookshops and book distributors, public entities, and NGOs. “In particular, Malta Libraries have taken a very active role in this year’s edition of the festival, working with both the National Book Council and the National Literacy Agency to set up activities meant to encourage the young to read more. This is in keeping with the ministry’s mission to raise the level of literacy and reading among local communities.”

The festival will cater to all readers PHOTO: Omar Camilleri/DOI

The Italian Cultural Centre, the Spanish Embassy, and the French Embassy are seemingly also very active in the event, representing foreign languages. The stand of the latter will be host to Librairie ‘La Boucherie’ Paris and Biblionef, an NGO that distributes books in over 66 countries.

The festival will reportedly reserve weekday mornings for young readers and schoolchildren, with special activities such as drama and adventure activities being prepared for them. There will also be other child-oriented activities in the evenings, it added.

In order to facilitate accessibility, a shuttle service will be running from the vicinity of the Independence monument in Floriana to the Mediterranean Conference Centre all day at the weekend.