• Submitted by: manso
• Arts and Culture
• 03 / 08 / 2011

---

2011.03.07 -/ radiorebelde.Cuban Book Fair Wrapped Up, Next Year’s Dedicated to the Caribbean. SANTIAGO DE CUBA.-  Next year’s International Book Fair, Cuba 2012, will be dedicated to the Caribbean peoples and intellectuals Zoila Lapique and Ambrosio Fornet, as announced during the closing ceremony of this year’s event.

Cuban Culture Minister Abel Prieto said the International Book Fair Cuba 2011 was characterized by an exceptional spiritual and cultural display of the Cuban people.

In the closing ceremony of the 20th International Book Fair, Prieto recalled one of the most unexpected and important moments of Fidel Castro’s meeting with a group of intellectuals to whom he reminded of the importance of their work in the defense of humanity.

Prieto also noted the role of young artists and thinkers in maintaining the achievements of the Revolution and added that it is up to them to continue promoting reading habits as well as debates about present-day topics in the period in-between the fairs.

President of the Cuban Book Institute Zuleica Romay ratified that the Cuban book fair is the literary event gathering the largest audience and with the greatest cultural impact in the island, and an space to enhance national values.

More than 2.2 million people visited the fair’s venues in all the provinces. Attending the closing ceremony were National Literature and Edition prizewinner Ambrosio Fornet, nad National Social Sciences prizewinner Zoila Lapique, and other personalities of the literary field and political officials from Santiago de Cuba.

Ambassador of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines to Cuba, Dexter Rose, and dean of ambassadors of the Caribbean Community expressed the importance of dedicated next year’s event to his islands in favor of strengthening the relations between both peoples and the knowledge about Caribbean nations.

Since its inauguration on February 10 at the San Carlos de la Cabaña Fortress, Habana, the artistic and literary program of the event included book presentations, discussions, and activities to encourage children and youngsters to read.

The 20th Cuba book fair was dedicated to the contries of the Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of Our America (ALBA) and to the bicentenary of the first Latin American independence.ACN.