There’s still time to catch the event—touted as the largest of its kind in the world—this weekend. It’s open to the public Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. This year’s event highlights the writing, arts and culture of Israel.
The massive event fills Guadalajara’s large expo center to the brim while highlighting the culture and creativity of Mexico and beyond. It also includes areas exclusively for international works and another focused solely writing for children.
The fair has workshops for school kids and thousands have embarked on field trips to the event in the hope it will instill in them a lifelong appreciation of reading. Increasing access to books is a major point of the fair and one discussion at the event dealt with improving availability for the visually disabled by developing new systems for printing books in braille.
The book fair inspires conversation on a wide array of topics, with some still to come. On Sunday, Mexican actor Demian Bichir will present the book, “Dr. Q. Historia de cómo un jornalero migrante se convirtió en neurocirujano,” written by Dr. Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa, which tells how the doctor went from being a laborer picking tomatoes to become a surgeon fighting brain cancer. Bichir was nominated for an Academy Award for his role in the 2011 film “A Better Life,” in which he played a gardener in Los Angeles who’s deported for being in the United States illegally.
Also Sunday, Jaime Maussan, Mexico’s leading ufologist, will discuss sightings of unidentified flying objects with author Alfonso Salazar.
Many prominent authors have already been featured at the event.
David Grossman, a lauded Israeli author whose work has been translated into more than 30 languages, spoke on Monday about the artistic richness of his country.
When talking about how he creates literature in a country that’s been torn by conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, Grossman—whose been critical of his own country’s policies—said by working to see through the eyes of Palestinians, Jews can discover things about themselves.
“Total justice—one side winning—is a thing of fanatics and extremists. No rational person can think that way. I believe in a justice of human proportions, necessarily painful for both sides,” he said, according to a FIL news release.
A highlight of the opening weekend was the Saturday night conversation between Israeli President and Nobel Peace Prize winner Shimon Peres and former Spanish prime minister Felipe Gonzalez. Tight security at the discussion, which was scheduled to start at 8 p.m., led the event moderated by historian Enrique Krauze to start about 40 minutes late.
In front of an audience of about 500, Peres and Gonzalez discussed democracy, nationalism, extremism, religion and the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine.
Gonzalez said peace in Israel could not be reached through the construction of a wall in the West Bank and that the international community must encourage Israel and Palestine to sit down and negotiate.
Peres pointed out that reaching peace would remain complicated so long as Palestinians are divided.
“I am 90 years old, and when I look back I see that we reached peace with Egypt and Jordan, which seemed unreachable. Now we have an opportunity to reach it with Palestine,” said Peres, according to a FIL news release. “We are in negotiations and I can see important changes in the Arab world: when we began the Arab League it was completely hostile, whereas now they have presented their own proposal for peace. Yet it is still difficult.”
Before the international book fair began, about 40 people gathered at the Minerva Fountain Friday morning to protest the presence of Israel as the invited country.
For more information about the event go to www.fil.com.mx