Hungary, Iceland and Freedom of Speech at the Göteborg Book Fair

Hungarian literature in the spotlight. Special focus on freedom of speech and Icelandic literature. These are the main features of this year’s Book Fair seminar programme which encompasses 388 programme points with 780 writers and lecturers from 31 countries. Göteborg Book Fair, 24–27 September, is the largest annual cultural event in Scandinavia.

Hungarian literature has long had a prominent position in world literature, not least due to the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Literature, Imre Kertész. Among many of the acclaimed Hungarian authors visiting the 2015 Göteborg Book Fair you will encounter Péter Esterházy, who in his latest novel, Márk-változat (The Version of Mark), writes about the fate of his noble family under communist rule. The author, translator and journalist, Noémi Szécsi, who among other things has been awarded the European Union Prize for Literature, has found great success for her novel, The Finno-Ugrian Vampire, in which she makes the most of the gender-neutrality of her mother tongue. Ádám Bodor, raised in Romania and presently residing in Hungary, was imprisoned due to his fight against communism in his home country. In his novel, The Sinistra Zone, he portrays the degradation and absurdity of the dictatorship.

Several Hungarian authors are being published in Swedish translations this year: Krisztina Tóth (the novella collection Pixel), Ágnes Judit Kiss and Dániel Varró.

The Hungarian Cultural Centre, Balassi Institute, has invited in a total of twenty authors, historians, politicians and others who will highlight subjects in contemporary Hungarian literature, the significance of translation, the Hungarian Uprising of 1956 and the unique characteristics of the Hungarian language.

Other partners in cooperation have also arranged seminars connected to Hungary. For example, the philosopher Ágnes Heller will speak about power and resistance in her life and in Hungary.

Voices from Iceland
Although Iceland has some of the world’s lowest crime rates, the country still knows a thing or two about the subject and can take pride in a number of successful crime novelists. Two of them, Arnaldur Indriðason, whose books have been published in more than 30 countries and sold millions of copies, and Árni Þórarinsson, are included in this year’s “Voices from Iceland” theme.

Love is a subject which will also be discussed extensively in a few of the Icelandic seminars. Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir (The Greenhouse) and Jón Kalman Stefánsson (Fish Have No Feet) have awakened the delight of readers across Europe with their novels focused on love. Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir became the world’s first openly homosexual prime minister when she was married in 2010. Her wife, Jónína Leósdóttir, has now written a candid book, Jóhanna and I, about their life together and marriage.

Free and the Unfree Speech
Next year it will have been 250 years since the Swedish Freedom of the Press Act was introduced, the first of its kind in the world. In 2015 and 2016, the Book Fair will emphasise the condition and preconditions of free speech in a large number of seminars.
Ian Buruma, Anglo-Dutch professor of Human Rights and Journalism, and the Russian-American journalist and author, Masha Gessen, will speak about the challenges, threats and opportunities for freedom of speech in 2015.

EUNIC (European Union National Institutes for Culture) has set up several seminars about freedom and freedom of speech, including, for example, the Polish poet and Nobel Prize candidate, Adam Zagajewski as well as Catherine Beaunez, satirical cartoonist from France, the Swiss author and human rights activist, Irena Brežná, and the Ukrainian-German author Katja Petrowskaja.

Several World-renowned Names at the Book Fair
Many of the world’s most-talked about authors are participating in seminars at the 2015 Göteborg Book Fair. Based on his latest novel, The Children Act, Ian McEwan will speak about being forced to choose between life and death. Conn Iggulden, current with part two of his novel series about the War of the Roses, will explain how he writes fact-based, historical fiction. Antony Beevor (Ardennes 1944), one of the world’s foremost military historical authors, will discuss various perspectives on the First and Second World Wars with Peter Englund (1915).

Paula Hawkins has, with her critically renowned, The Girl on the Train, written one of the bestselling debut novels ever. Daniel Kehlmann (F), who met success with Measuring the World, has created a family saga for people who don’t like family sagas. Biology professor, Dave Goulson (A Sting in the Tale), will tell us about everything worth knowing about bumblebees. Fantasy author, Laini Taylor (Dreams of Gods and Monsters), is a role model in the way she depicts strong female characters. She has accumulated a large fanbase in the blogosphere. Sally Green, also successful within the fantasy genre, set the world record with her dark debut, Half Bad, which was translated to a total of 45 languages before it was published.

Loretta Napoleoni (The Islamist Phoenix) and Patrick Cockburn (The Rise of Islamic State), two of the world’s foremost experts on the Islamic State, discuss the organisation’s brutal advance. The authors and filmmakers, Xiaolu Guo (I Am China), born in a Chinese fishing village and residing in London for the last 13 years, and Hassan Blasim (The Iraqi Christ), who The Guardian has declared to be “perhaps the best writer of Arabic fiction alive”, will discuss writing and filmmaking in exile.

Owen Jones (The Establishment), the new star of British social criticism will highlight the economic power elite’s increasing influence over politics. Lilian Thuram (My Black Stars: From Lucy to Barack Obama), defender in France’s national football team which won the 1998 World Cup and Euro 2000, will talk about his work with prejudice against ethnicity and origin in schools.

Numerous Nordic writers
Writers from all Nordic countries, in particular from Sweden, will be the main part of the seminar programme. A list of all those participating in the programme can be found here.

Read the full programme here.
For more information, visit www.goteborg-bookfair.com

For additional information, please contact:
Joanna Wahlsten, press contact Göteborg Book Fair
jw@bokmassan.se, +46 (0)31–708 84 13

The Göteborg Book Fair 2015 takes place September 24–27 at The Swedish Exhibition & Congress Centre in Göteborg, Sweden. The focal theme will be Hungary and Hungarian literature. The Göteborg Book Fair, with 100,000 visitors each year, is the biggest cultural event in Scandinavia and provides the largest meeting place for Nordic literature in the world.