CHENNAI: School Education Minister Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi on Tuesday announced that the fourth edition of the Chennai International Book Fair (CIBF) will be held from January 16 to 18 at the Kalaivanar Arangam. For the first time, the event will be open to the members of the public, and they could register through online, he said.
This year’s edition will feature the organising committee of the Frankfurt Book Fair, one of the world’s largest and oldest book fairs, as the Guest of Honour, with publishers from more than 100 countries expected to participate. The three-day event will also host special literary and business sessions including a session by the French government for Tamil publishers, a seminar on Turkey’s TEDA Turkiye translation grant and workshops by the Bologna Children’s Book Fair on painting, design, translation and cartooning. Sessions on textbooks with illustrations led by the Iranian government will also be held.
The minister also released the CIBF logo on the occasion, and said the fair is being organised with the motto “Taking Tamil to the World and the World to Tamil”, reflecting the state’s emphasis on promoting literature and reading. The fair, jointly organised by the Tamil Nadu Textbook and Educational Services Corporation and the Directorate of Public Libraries, will facilitate the signing of Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) to translate the works of Tamil writers into foreign languages and vice versa.
CIBF is positioned as a unique B2B (business-to-business) platform that brings together international conferences, publishing trade shows and literary forums.