TÜYAP Book Fair kicks off with Egypt

ISTANBUL- Hürriyet Daily News

The book fair is organized by TÜYAP Fair and Exhibition Organization, and will be held at the TÜYAP Fair and Convention Center, Büyükçekmece with the participation of more than 600 publishers and NGOs. 25 publishers from Egypt will exhibit thousands of titles in Arabic, Turkish and English. About half a million visitor are expected to visit the book fair this year.

On Saturday November 12 in TÜYAP Fair and Convention Center, the Minister of Culture of the Republic of Turkey Ertuğrul Günay and the Minister of Culture of the Arab Republic of Egypt Dr. Emad Abou-Ghazi will preside over the opening ceremony along with Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu, the Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).

A series of Egyptian cultural activities and events will take place at TÜYAP Fair and Convention Center during the fair. They cover a variety of subjects from cinema to literature and history.

The events will include seminars and panels of discussions with the visiting guest writers from Egypt ; Gamal Ghitani, Mohammed Salmawy , Ibrahim Aslan, Mai Khaled and poetry readings by poet Ahmed El Shahawy. A panel discussion will be held to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Naguib Mahfouz, the only Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature from the Arab world.

In addition, selected movies from the Egyptian cinema will be screened with Turkish subtitles as part of the Egyptian Cinema Days, these movies are: Yacoubian Building, A Beginning and An End, Al kit-kat, and Scheherazade Tell Me a Story, along with another three Egyptian movies with English subtitles which are: Al-maseer (Destiny) , Al-Arad (The Land), and One-Zero

The Nile folkloric Music and Dance Troupe will perform on the opening day, November 12. The troupe will perform popular music from Upper Egypt and the Delta region.

A photography exhibition of around 80 different photos and pictures about the 25th of January “EL TAHRIR” Egyptian revolution will also be on display during the same period. The exhibition is designed to reflect different stages of the revolution in the form of a tour through the time span of the revolution.

The Fair will also include a panel discussion on translation and the history of Egyptian Turkish relations and a seminar about cooperation between publishers and book fairs in both countries where the Director General of Cairo Book Fair will speak.

The Egyptian Ambassador in Ankara Abderahman Salaheldin expressed his hopes that the Egyptian participation in the book fair will help increase the cultural cooperation between Egypt and Turkey.

Salaheldin referred to the growing interest on both sides to learn about the culture of the other. “Language has been a major barrier and we are hoping to give a boost to translation from Turkish into Arabic and vice versa to attain better understanding between the people of these two intertwined cultures. Reading each others’ books and enjoying each others’ movies and music would make us further recognize how close Egyptians and Turks are.” Salaheldin said.