Book festival Sept. 13-29 at Pedion tou Areos
This year’s book festival at the Pedion tou Areos park offers book lovers more than 45,000 titles and a range of book-related events. More than 300 publishers are exhibiting their wares in smart new stalls at the festival, which starts tomorrow and runs till September 29. President Costis Stephanopoulos will conduct the official opening on September 17 at 8 p.m. The festival is run by the League of Book Publishers (SEKB) in collaboration with the City of Athens, and sponsored by Alpha television channel and Polis 88.6 radio station. This year the organizers have adopted the slogan of «Support for School Libraries,» which is reflected in the festival poster depicting a three-dimensional artwork created from books by the artist Pavlos. Pavlos will be autographing copies of the poster for visitors on the first days of the festival. Books and music Music is always part of the book festival, and Athens Municipality is offering three free evening concerts at the outdoor Aliki Theater in the park. The Athens Philharmonia will play works by Mozart, Beethoven, Hadjidakis, Markopoulos and other composers (23/9), the Athens Municipality’s Big Band offers summer jazz from Polynesia and the Caribbean (24/9), and the Athens Municipality’s Greek Music Workshop presents new wave music with Katy Homata (25/9). The Paralympics, the other side of the Athens 2004 Olympic Games, will have a special stand at the festival, where visitors can meet Olympic and Paralympic medal winners and purchase Olympic souvenirs. Bibliocafe Bibliocafe, organized by the National Book Center (EKEBI), is a comfortable area where visitors can take a break, have coffee and attend presentations of books and writers. The work of a different writer will be presented every day at 8 p.m. EKEBI also has an exhibit of its own activities devoted to promoting the Greek book world, and Bibliocafe will be the venue for two open discussions on school libraries. The 31st Book Festival is open every day 6 p.m. – 10.30 p.m. (11 p.m. Friday and Saturday) and every Sunday 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. and 6 p.m. – 10.30 p.m. Modernist accounts, on the other hand, cannot explain how it is possible that so many people can be made to share the same illusion, as it were, and even be willing to die for it.
