500th ANNIVERSARY OF ARMENIAN BOOK-PRINTING TO BE SOLEMNLY MARKED IN ARMENIA IN 2012

Noyan Tapan
Oct 29, 2008

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 29, NOYAN TAPAN. The 500th anniversary of Armenian
book-printing will be solemnly marked in 2012 in Armenia. RA President
Serzh Sargsyan will head the jubilee governmental commission on
organizing the festive events. As Levon Ananian, the Chairman of
the Union of Writers of Armenia, reported at the October 28 press
conference, within four years they have a possibility to prepare well
and to implement all programs that need to be worked out. At the same
time he said that he is going to submit his proposals at the jubilee
commission’s second sitting to be held in January 2009.

In particular, the Chairman of the Union of Writers of Armenia proposes
working out a national reading program, which, according to L. Ananian,
will be an important step to overcome the reading crisis. It is
also planned to submit for discussion the bill On Book-Publishing
Sphere being in the RA National Assembly for several years. Besides,
L. Ananian proposes creating a University of Translators in Armenia,
which will enable to present works of Armenian classics, modern
Armenian writers in different languages of the world, as well as
to translate works of orld classics and modern world writers into
Armenian.

As the Chairman of the Union of Writers of Armenia evaluated it,
first of all bookstores need to be opened in all regions of the
country for book-publishing to develop. According to L. Ananian,
much attention should be also paid to libraries. "Every published book
should be given to libraries. However, it is impossible to give a book
published in 400-500 copies to several hundred libraries functioning
in the country. These are important problems that need to be given
a solution on the threshold of the 500th anniversary of Armenian
book-printing," L. Ananian emphasized.