İstanbul Book Fair is the most democratic platform in the country, says Kavukçuoğlu

“We prove that a coexistence of different views is possible,” Kavukçuoğlu said in an interview with Today’s Zaman. “Since 1982 we have been able to give an equal chance and living space to every political idea, ideology and religious belief for nine days in the fair. On one side you can find the Alevi or Bahai publishers and on the other side you can come across publishing houses promoting the ideas of Said Nursi or secular publishers. In a total of 297 activities in this year’s fair, we will provide a free platform for ideas to be voiced. From this point of view, we are proud [to say] the İstanbul Book Fair is the most democratic platform in Turkey,” he added.

Comparing the İstanbul fair with its long-running international counterpart in Frankfurt, Kavukçuoğlu strongly denied criticism that TÜYAP has failed to turn the fair into an international event, saying: “The İstanbul and Frankfurt fairs are different. In the Frankfurt Book Fair, readers cannot buy books. It is an event whose main purpose is to gather the publishing industry for generally commercial purposes. Publishing companies do not open pavilions for individual buyers at the Frankfurt fair. People visit the Frankfurt fair only to meet the authors and join cultural and intellectual activities organized as part of the event. In contrast, the İstanbul Book Fair put its emphasis on making [more] books available to the general public. Authors, publishing companies and readers constitute the three legs of our fair. This has been our aim since the beginning. Publishing companies showcase thousands of books to sell at the fair. Therefore, since they have different goals, these two fairs cannot be compared,” he said.

This year, the İstanbul Book Fair includes an international pavilion, featuring publishers and authors from 27 countries, marking a first in the fair’s history. This is being considered in the industry as the first step to gaining an international reputation for the fair, which he said has “the largest number of [average] visitors among its counterparts in Europe.”

“Attracting 350,000 visitors can be considered a success for a book fair in İstanbul,” said Kavukçuoğlu, an author who has penned over a dozen books, including novels, memoirs, short stories and essays.

The 66-year-old writer disagrees on the widespread claim that Turkish people do not read books and complains that statistics on the number of books circulating in the Turkish market are misleading.

“Religious books have not been included on bestseller lists. You cannot find any books on religion on those lists. However, every devout Muslim owns an ilmihal (a manual on Islamic religious practices) and a me’al (a translation of the Quran). … If you do not consider the translation of the Quran a book, you are definitely ignoring a considerable number of readers. A book is a book. We have to categorize books according to their context, as is done in Europe, and then we will be able to clearly see the entire number of readers. Furthermore, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism publishes 35,000 books a year on average; this number is not reflected in the lists, so we don’t have clear results.”

Kavukçuoğlu says the Sept. 12, 1980 military coup seriously damaged people’s interest in reading. “There is greater interest in books now compared to 15 years ago,” Kavukçuoğlu says, but adds: “When you compare it with the figures of 35 years ago, you will see the negative effect of the military coup, which considered books as [tools] of those involved in [thought] crime. A generation has been raised with that fear and alienated from reading. The coup assaulted the cultural privacy of people. The number of novels published in Turkey in the years following the coup is embarrassing. Writers were incredibly discouraged against writing. Some effects of this fear still prevail,” he said.

Kavukçuoğlu also pointed to the polarization of society, which he thinks can be observed in every part of life, even in books. “For example, when you go to a bookstore and ask for a conservative Muslim author’s book, the salesman says they do not sell that particular author’s books. Then if you go to another bookshop, the seller may say that they do not sell the books of Aziz Nesin [a late Turkish leftist author who publicly declared he was an atheist]. This is internalized fascism. This is not ethical. Democracy is the only way with which we can surmount this polarization.”

TÜYAP also organizes book fairs in other Turkish cities, including Bursa in the northwest and Adana in the south. Kavukçuoğlu said demand grows every year, with various cities asking TÜYAP to organize local book fairs. “We have organized similar fairs in İzmir, Adana and Bursa. Our plan for next year is to launch a book fair in Diyarbakır. For this fair, we will invite publishers from northern Iraq with their Kurdish books to highlight the multicultural characteristics of the region.”