Israel will be the invited country at this year’s edition of Bookfest, one of the biggest book fairs in Romania, which will take place between June 1 and June 5 at Romexpo in Bucharest.

Israel’s participation at the fair will take place under the motto ‘Never stop dreaming’ and will allow Romanian audiences to meet contemporary Israeli authors, sample books in Hebrew, and Romanian translations of well-known Israeli works. The invited authors coming to Bucharest this June are: Zeruya Shalev, Gil Hovav, Dror Mishani, Rony Oren, Fania Oz-Salzberger, and Meir Shalev.

Visitors will be able to attend more than 300 events, as varied as book launches, talks, cinema screenings and others. Around 200 publishing houses are present at the fair, where entrance is free.

Israel is the seventh invited partner at Bookfest, after Spain in 2010, Hungary in 2011, France in 2012, Germany, Austria and Switzerland in 2013, Poland in 2014, and the Czech Republic in 2015.

The fair is organized each year by the Association of Romanian Publishers (Asociația Editorilor din România) and has been included by the Culture Ministry on the list of priority projects to which it directs financing. The fair began under the name Bookarest and in 2012 it expanded throughout the country with local editions in Timisoara, Cluj-Napoca, Iasi, Targu-Mures, and Brasov.

Who are the Israeli authors coming at Bookfest 2016?

Israeli author Zeruya Shalev has had her work translated all over Europe and her novels Love Life, Husband and Wife, Thera, The Remains of Love are international best-sellers. Five of her titles have been translated in Romanian, the most recent being Pain (Durere) at Polirom publishing house. Besides fiction, she also published poetry and a children’s book.

Fania Oz-Salzberger is the oldest daughter of writer Amos Oz and a respected cultural and political figure. She teaches at the University of Haifa. Her opinion articles have been published in Newsweek, the International Herald Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, Le Figaro, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, and Ha’aretz. In 2012, she co-authored with her father Jews and the Words, translated in Romanian at Humanitas Fiction.

Writer and journalist Meir Shalev’s 1988 novel The Blue Mountain (Roman rusesc in Romanian) is one of the five best-selling Israeli novels of all times. His books have been translated into 26 languages and in 2014 he received the French distinction of Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.

Dror Mishani writes crime fiction. He is also a translator and literature scholar, specializing in detective fiction. His series featuring police inspector Avraham Avraham and is translated in over fifteen languages, including English, Swedish, and German. The first novel in the series, The Missing File, was a finalist in 2013 at the Crime Writers’ Association CWA International Dagger Award.

Gil Hovav is a culinary journalist who started his career as a restaurant critic and after doing newspaper editing work moved to produce and present some of Israel’s most popular culinary shows: Pepper, Garlic and Olive Oil, Captain Cook, and Going to the Market. The three novels he authored are inspired by the history of the Hovav family and his own childhood.

Rony Oren is known for the more than 500 animation films featuring clay figurines and over 30 children’s books. In 1978, he established Frame by Frame, the animation studio producing the films based on the ‘clayground method.’ Some of the best-known series he produced include The Egg, Foxy Fables and Grabbit the Rabbit, broadcast in over 80 countries. The Animated Haggadah is one of his best-known children’s titles, which have been translated in the UK, US, France, Germany, Russia, Denmark, Italy, and Greece.

Simona Fodor, simona@citycompass.ro

(Photo source: Bookfest on Facebook)