TURKEY PROMISES DIVERSITY AT FRANKFURT BOOK FAIR – FEATURE

Earthtimes (press release), UK
June 12 2008

Berlin – Turkey promised Thursday to bring its cultural diversity
this October to the Frankfurt Book Fair, where its literature will
have guest-of-honour status this year. Speaking from Frankfurt,
organizers said 350 authors and translators from Turkey will be at
the world’s principal book fair, presenting their work to publishers
from round the globe and touring Frankfurt and other German cities
to meet literature lovers.

Ethnic minorities will be included, said Muge Gursoy Sokmen, co-chair
of the organizing committee.

She said Kurdish authors Lal Lales and Seyhmus Diken, Armenian writers
Migirdic Margosyan and Jaklin Celik, and Jewish writer Mario Levi
would be making appearances in person.

At the October 15-19 fair, a special exhibition about Turkish
literature is to also highlight the little-known "layers" that are
woven in with Turkic origins in the country’s culture today.

"You’ll see how it includes Arab or Armenian or Byzantine roots too,"
she said.

"We have to treat the heritage of our cultural diversity with respect,"
said Sokmen, who is a leftist Istanbul publisher. "We see this as a
very rich resource."

Guest-of-honour shows over the past three decades at Frankfurt
sometimes focus on small, obscure nations, but there will be no
forgetting this year’s.

The cultural ferment in Turkey, where intellectuals are arguing about
whether and how political Islam can be reconciled with modernity, is
not just a literary topic, but also world news, with Turkish judges
now mulling a ban on Turkey’s AKP ruling party.

Debate about whether the AKP, which has Islamic roots, is moving Turkey
forwards or backwards arouses deep passions not only in Turkey itself,
but in the Islamic world and the West too.

Germans’ ambivalence about whether to accept Turkey as a European
Union member and their troubled relationship with Turks, the main
ethnic minority in the country, make Frankfurt an apt place to hear
Turkish intellectuals speak about their nation’s huge strides.

"At least 2.5 million people here are of Turkish origin and there
is a rich German Turkish literature. That’s one reason Turkey is
felt here to be very close, as if it were a next-door neighbour,"
said Juergen Boos, the book fair chief executive.

Orhan Pamuk, the Nobel Literature Prize winner in 2006, will help
Turkish President Abdullah Gul open the fair.

Hundreds of performers, artists and other creative people will round
out the show.

Ahmet Ari, the coordinator of the Turkish presentation, said the show
would not just focus on the riches of Turkish literature awaiting
translation into other languages, but also provide room for political
controversy about a nation going through rapid change.

He said Turkey had greatly improved democracy in recent years and
there was no longer a single author in jail on account of political
views. Turkish state television had begun its first non-Turkish-
language broadcasts just a few days ago, he added.

He was referring to official Turkey’s decades-old policy of repressing
minority languages. The centre-right government of AKP Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan has eased many restrictions in another move
being closely watched from around the world.

Turkey has 1,724 publishing houses with annual sales equivalent to
810 million dollars (516 million euros).

The Frankfurt Book Fair is the major opportunity in world book
publishing to boost exports. In the international pavilions, publishers
and literary agents negotiate on translation rights.

For a German audience, the fair celebrates the newest and best books
available at Christmas, the main sales season for German books.