GREAT BAY/MARIGOT, St. Martin —The 13th annual St. Martin Book Fair is set for June 4 – 6, 2015, said Shujah Reiph, book fair coordinator and president of Conscious Lyrics Foundation (CLF).
Novelists, poets, historians, scholars, drama and performance word artists from India, UK, Brazil, St. Lucia, the USA, to name a few places, “are heading our way,” said Reiph.
Prime Minister Marcel Gumbs has already extended a welcoming hand to book fair guests and is encouraging the island’s people to, “Have a very successful St. Martin Book Fair.”
“Tishani Doshi, the stunning and internationally acclaimed novelist from India; Luiz Bernardo Pericás, one of Brazil’s leading intellectuals, social critics, and historians; and the St. Lucian poet Vladimir Lucien, who just won the US$10,000 Bocas Literary Prize in Trinidad, will be among the festival’s twenty-odd guest authors,” said Jacqueline Sample, president of House of Nehesi Publishers (HNP).
“It is now an exciting tradition for St. Martin people and visitors to meet our guest writers and workshop leaders, those from St. Martin and those from around the world, at the book fair,” said Sample.
“The Word …” is the theme for book fair 2015. “We’re looking forward to three days of sharing new books and fascinating ideas between writers and the general public,” said Sample. “The visit by new and famous authors to schools on both sides of our island is growing in demand; and the free workshops and live multilingual literary readings add to the excitement.”
Prime Minister Gumbs has likened the literary festival to “a book party for the whole family.” In typical Friendly St. Martin fashion, the prime minister said that he considers “all the participants in this book jamboree, family.”
As a symbol of the island’s historical and family unity, the book fair’s opening ceremony is alternated each year between both capitals. “This year Marigot will host the opening on Thursday, June 4,” said Reiph. The home of the fair’s main day of book sales, book signings, and workshops is at the University of St. Martin, on Saturday, June 6.
Conscious Lyrics Foundation (CLF) and House of Nehesi Publishers (HNP) organize the St. Martin Book Fair in collaboration with its strategic partner the St. Maarten Tourist Bureau, the University of St. Martin (USM), LC Fleming Foundation, and St. Martin Tourist Office.
