April in Bulgaria will be marked by a spectacular march with books as its main characters and not crusaders. The territories that are to be conquered are the hearts of the kids. Popular Bulgarians from different cultural and public spheres will be the knights and leaders, who will carry the children into the magical world of fairy tales. The Bulgarian Book association is the main reason for the happening, as it has taken over the difficult task to encourage reading among these little fellows.

“The March of Books links two global dates, related to books and reading – April 2 – the International Children’s Book Day and April 23 – World Book and Copyright Day,” Chair of the Board of the Bulgarian Book Association Veselin Todorov said for RB. “This is something that has turned into a tradition. Our goal is to bring together young people and especially children. Traditionally, Mayor Yordanka Fandakova will read to kids from a visiting kindergarten at the opening. The March is supported by many famous people – contemporary writers, actors, sports persons, politicians… Those meet the kids in schools, kindergartens and libraries and read to them excerpts from favorite children’s books. The meetings are called a Marathon of Reading and are under the auspices of the Library – Information Association. Of course, the writers present their latest works. We have several new things – for instance, a game organized in Sofia with the participation of 9 of the major bookstores. The goal is the participants to go through all the nine and gather 9 stamps on a special voucher. Of course, there are rewards too – a selection of very interesting children’s books, gifted by Bulgarian publishers. Public readings will be organized on April 12 – 13 in two tents in the Borisova Garden. There is also a contest for a favorite children’s book, where we partner with the Children’s Books foundation. It is called Magic Pearl and is online. The kids are the jury and can vote for their favorite book. The results will be announced on April 30 with an interesting event planned for the winners.”

The children will have the chance to get on the literature retro tramway that will move along a special route downtown Sofia. They will meet there contemporary Bulgarian writers and poets, popular persons, who will read a favorite bedtime story. Traditionally, on April 23 the Bulgarian Book association will hand the Knight of Book awards to journalists, who contributed with their work over the years for popularization of books.

Does the average Bulgarian read?

According to data of the Bulgarian Book association some 6,000 new titles were published last year. In 2013 the Bulgarians spent about EUR 77 mln. on books, or 2 percent more on the previous year. However, we are still seriously lagging behind Europe, despite this growth. The average European buys 11 – 12 books on the average, while here in Bulgaria we buy 1 – 2. In the words of Vesselin Todorov there is a wrong impression that people tend to read translations only. It turns out that 2/3 of the titles published belong to Bulgarian authors. We can hope that initiatives such as the March of Books will succeed in making children more curious to reading.

The program of the March of Books can be found on the Facebook page of the event.

English version: Zhivko Stanchev