Speaking in Croatia (Part 3) - Pictures of the Istria Book Fair

[From Part 2]

This was the opening ceremony, which was on Day-2 of my visit.


The "12th Dreamlike Book Fair in Istria" [Sa(n)jam knjige u Istri], held at Pula (found an old 2007 press release, here).

The crowd rushing to be first into the fair.


It's a yearly affair, organised by the city of Pula. A reading festival and book publishers' exhibition combined.





The Croatian Librarians rountable Croatian Library Association "Librarians' Weekend" session, at which I spoke yesterday, was also part of the programme. This is certainly something for Singapore to consider!

The fair organisers found it a strategic fit to include [an informal] conference for librarians, who were based in various parts of their country. Naturally the librarians attending the conference "Librarians Weekend" would also end up buying books for their libraries.

The fair also has a Children's festival called Monte Librić.


The Croatian librarians who were hosting me were mostly (if not all) Children's Librarians. They kept mentioning "Monte Librić", and spent a lot of time in this room, shopping for books for their library (and for their family as well).

Seemed to me the book fair was very well attended each day, on a weekday no less. The rooms (where the publishers displayed their books) always had people milling around. I'm not sure how the sales were though.

Interesting, various speakers and participants at the Librarians' Roundtable Weekend session kept remarking at how majority of Children's Literature published in Croatia was of "poor quality" (no, I don't understand Croatian; just so happens there was a translator).

Will blog more about this in another post.

[Next: Part 4]