General appearance of the visitors to the international book fair of the city of Guadalajara on December 5, 2019. Thousands of people have visited the Guadalajara Philharmonic which reached its sixth day of activities.
Hector Guerrero / El Pa's
The Guadalajara International Book Fair (FIL) joins the majority of cultural events that, forced by the pandemic, have been forced to move their program this year to the virtual sphere.
After speculating even a possible cancellation, the 34th edition of the largest publishing contest in Spanish in the world will be held, during the week of November 28 to December 6, but it will be carried out through its website and social networks.
"We have made an effort, but the health recommendations and restrictions for massive events and international travel, especially protecting the health of partners, visitors, participants and exhibitors, force us to move the content only for this year to the virtual environment", has said this Friday the president of the fair, Raúl Padilla López, in a press conference also digital.
The program is not yet known, which will be made public at the end of October.
The organization has confirmed, in any case, that the main legs of the event, the literary, academic, scientific and related content with book professionals will be maintained.
Large publishers such as Random Penguin House, along with independents such as Cal and Arena, already announced in early June their refusal to participate in an alleged physical format.
The presence of the guest of honor scheduled for this edition, the Arab emirate of Sharjah, has also been on the air until the last moment.
Finally, he will not be present and his participation will be scheduled for two years from now, in 2022, due to the commitments already made for next year.
The 2021 guest of honor has yet to be revealed.
During the spring months, the organization hoped to be able to carry out the event in person.
She came to present a remarkable package of security measures: from the limitation of the capacity to a maximum of 5,000 people at a time in the 40,000 meters of exhibition of the pavilion to a cap of 25% of the capacity of the halls, through the.
He also announced an economic incentive: a 30% discount on the fees for the installation of
stands
.
The organization confirmed this Friday that it will return the money paid by exhibitors who had already hired a place.
FIL closed its doors last year with more than 800,000 visitors, 800 authors from more than 35 countries and almost 21,000 book professionals.
On June 9, the fair received the Princess of Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities together with the Hay Festival, which has also been forced to transfer its contest to digital format this year.
The Frankfurt fair, the largest publishing event in the world, also recently confirmed that its 2020 edition, on October 14 and 18, will also be virtual.