TEHRAN – The virtual edition of the Tehran Book Fair, which opened on Tuesday, is organizing 17 international webinars on various cultural topics.

The book fair, which will run for six days, can be found through tehranbookfair.ir.

The Persian language in Europe was discussed in the first webinar of the fair on Wednesday. A number of Iranian and Turkish publishers held a session on the translation of children’s books. The topic was also scrutinized in a webinar by Iranian and Arab publishing houses.

On Thursday, a session will study the Persian language in the Indian Peninsula. In addition, the translation and publication of the resistance and Islamic revolution literature will be discussed in a webinar by Iranian and Arab publishers. A Spanish translation of the book “Roots of the Islamic Revolution” will be reviewed in a session.

The Friday webinars will open with a session on the Persian language in Africa and the Arab countries. The publication of Iranian books in the Balkan region will also be discussed during another session.         

On Saturday, the fellowship potential of Istanbul with the printing industry in Iran and the Persian language in Arab countries will be discussed in two separate webinars. The Translation and Publication Grant Program of Iran and similar programs in Turkey and Serbia will be reviewed in a session.

The Persian language in the Caucasus and Central Asian countries will be scrutinized in a webinar on Sunday. A webinar will also pay tribute to Afghan writer Mohammad-Azam Rahnavard-Zaryab, who died of COVID-19 in 2020. The expansion of relations between Iranian and Afghan publishers will be studied in another session.

A virtual meeting of the representatives of the literary agencies in Iran, Turkey and Germany will be held on the last day of the book fair on Monday. Chinese and Iranian publishers will also discuss plans to expand relations in a session. 

The 33rd edition of Iran’s most important cultural event was scheduled to be held in April 2020, and Turkey was slated to be the guest of honor, however, the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance canceled the fair due to a massive rise in the death toll from coronavirus in the country.

Finally, the ministry and the Iran Book and Literature House, the main organizers of the book fair, decided to run the event online.  

Photo: A poster for the virtual edition of the Tehran Book Fair.

MMS/YAW