At the 2025 Bienal do Livro in Rio de Janeiro, the Sharjah Book Authority and Sharjah World Book Capital stand. Image: SBA
By Porter Anderson, Editor-in-Chief | @Porter_Anderson
See also:
Rio Becomes UNESCO’s 2025 World Book Capital
Brazil’s Publishers Release New Book Market Research
One World Book Capital Visits Another
Brazil’s public-facing book fair, the 40th Bienal do Livro—which alternates each year with São Paulo—closed on Sunday (June 22) as a centerpiece event in the this year in which Rio de Janeiro has officially been made UNESCO‘s 2025 World Book Capital, Capital Mundial do Livro.
Sharjah’s 2019 World Book Capital logo
And as it happens, the United Arab Emirates’ Sharjah—the first Arabian Gulf city to hold the designation in 2019—was a weighty presence on the exhibition floor at the Rio fair. Bodour Al Qasimi, now chair of the Sharjah Book Authority and president of the American University in Sharjah, by 2021 was hosting developmental meetings of what would become a World Book Capital Network, a way for past-designated cities of the title to work in support of parts of the world publishing industry needing support and guidance.
But there’s of course more of a link between Brazil and the Arab world than Sharjah’s sisterhood in Rio’s new UNESCO designation: Brazil is reported to be home to the largest population of people of Arab descent outside the Arab world itself. Some estimates put the figure at between 10 and 12 million members of the Arab diaspora who live and work in Brazil.
Sharjah Book Authority, chaired by Al Qasimi with Ahmed bin Rakkad Al Ameri as its CEO, is of course the producing body of Sharjah International Book Fair (November 5 through 16) and the Sharjah Publishers Conference (November 2 through 4), which precedes it. It also is the de-facto home of PublisHer, the international network of professional women in the world book publishing industry, an organization founded by Al Qasimi in 2019 during London Book Fair.
Sharjah’s book fair, annually the largest in the region, has announced Greece as its guest of honor this year. And with the programming direction of Emma House, the directorial work of Mansour Al Hassani, the logistical and communications support of Tony Mulliken, and the fair’s Publishers Conference for industry professionals has become one of the most popular and astute of the international boo-fair circuit, heavily vested in its fast rights-trading floor and in comments from publishing newsmakers.
In Rio—with the World Book Capital as a celebratory lead—Sharjah has operated from a large pavilion blending the whites and natural-woods of the Gulf, as designed by Weam Ibrahim, whose Dubai-based Q7 Exhibition and Event Management is among the industry’s most meticulous in representing its client-exhibitor’s culture.
Al Ameri: ‘To Strengthen our Partnerships in Latin America’
Sharjah Book Authority CEO Ahmed Bin Rakkad Al Ameri at the 2024 Frankfurter Buchmesse. Image: Publishing Perspectives, Porter Anderson
In talking about his program in Brazil, Al Ameri says, “Sharjah’s presence in Rio highlights the central role of Emirati and Arab culture on the international knowledge map.
Related article: Rio Becomes UNESCO’s 2025 World Book Capital. Image: World Book Capital
“Today, we’re not only sharing our Emirati identity but also fostering a vibrant dialogue between Latin America, with its rich intellectual and cultural heritage, and the Arab world in all its expressions of thought, literature, art, and creativity.
“The selection of Rio as World Book Capital for 2025 offers us an opportunity to renew and strengthen our partnerships with the cultural community in Latin America.”
While in Rio, the Sharjah stand served not only as a center for Sharjah Book Authority, the World Book Capital Network, and the unique Sharjah Animation Conference, which until recently has been placed within the framework of the Sharjah Children’s Reading Festival, PublisHer, and a curated collection from Al Qasimi Publications—which is built on the writings of Sharjah’s author-emir, Sheikh Dr. Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, whose concept of Sharjah as a reading emirate is the foundation of the Sharjah Book Authority’s distinctive place in international publishing.
One of the programming events on the Sharjah stand included an examination of the “new literary movement,” as it’s being discussed, based in Sharjah as the emirate—home to Rashid Al Kous’ Emirates Publishers Association.
Al Ameri added that under Bodour Al Qasimi’s leadership of the Book Authority, “We are committed to empowering Emirati and Arab publishers and authors to reach new markets and to developing sustainable support systems that enhance their presence on the global publishing stage.”
If nothing else, Sharjah—through such events as its presence in Rio and a blistering schedule of guest-of-honor appearances in other markets—may well have the most frequently traveling leadership among the world’s book-publishing markets. And the program also, while in Brazil, engaged in panel discussions and held meetings with publishers, translators, and cultural organizations, particularly to expand opportunities for translating works to and from Arabic.
More from us on the World Book Capital program is here, more on the Brazilian book industry and market is here, and more on Sharjah Book Authority is here.
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