Salah Fass: Tehran International Book Fair perpetuates Islamic heritage

1402/01/29-17:09

Where there are more economic exchanges, the familiarity of the people of that land with the culture of both nations will be more visible. Tehran International Book Fair perpetuates Islamic heritage, the representative of Amal Lebanon Movement in Tehran, Salah Fass said pointing there should be spent enough time for the Tehran International Book Fair.

He said to the news headquarters of the 34th Tehran International Book Fair that God sent the Bible, Torah and Quran to people in different ages. The book is very valuable and is considered as one of the most important commodities in human life and the most basic tools for humanization, progress, culture and civilization.

He added: In general, one of our problems is the lack of study, and some people read books out of compulsion, which often includes textbooks. The book is considered as a factor in the progress of the nation and human being. When we look at the history, as Muslims were more authors and studied more, more than half of the world was under our control, but when we abandoned the studding book, the situation changed.

The publishing industry and books are considered influential elements in the process of cultural diplomacy, Fass further stated, nothing the contents of the book include the past, present and future of mankind, history, geography and other sciences, and one of the main problems of the present is that the social media and virtual space are now conquering the place of books; in other words, the status and dignity of this basic cultural commodity is being weakened.

He continued in another part of his speech that, currently, many people are using digital books instead of using paper books, and from this point of view, the suspicions are based on this. For example, if you take a photo with your mobile phone, you look at it once or twice, but if you have an album, you look at it every now and then; This is the best example to understand the difference between books and technology.

In another part of this conversation, Fass pointed out that the familiarity of Muslim nations with each other's culture is weak.

Currently in the world, economy is more dominant than culture. In fact, where there are more economic exchanges, the familiarity of the people of that land with the culture of both nations shows itself more, he stated.

He further referred to his visit to different periods of the Tehran International Book Fair, and said: I am more interested in statistics, engineering books, and on the other hand, political works, and the Tehran Sea Book Fair is full of works related to these fields and you can prepare the required books in this event.

He added: In my opinion, if we want our heritage to be continuous, we should organize exhibitions like the Tehran International Book Fair. In some periods of the Tehran International Book Fair, the Amal Movement and some Lebanese publishers were also present, but due to reasons such as sanctions, the presence of these publishers in the Tehran International Book Fair has decreased.

Fass said: "Tehran International Book Fair is a good and big exhibition and you should take time for it."

He also explained about the relations between Iranian and Lebanese publishers and said: one of the existing problems is that the publishers of the two countries do not translate and publish each other's works, so it is necessary to make efforts in this area as well. Imam Musa Sadr Cultural-Research Institute is one of the active centers in this field. Of course, it is also necessary to mention that translating Lebanese works into Persian is a bit difficult and few translators have expertise in this field.

 Fass mentioned that the world's first printing house was in Lebanon, and stated: The printing and final output of the works published in this country are of high quality, but the cost is more than what you see in Iran. Until about a decade ago, many Lebanese publishers traveled to Iran to present and publish their works, but the cost of transporting books is high.

Salah Fass pointed to the Amal movement, and said: This movement is a political party that also act as a cultural work and publishes books. But I should say that it does not have its own printing house and so far it has published works jointly with the Center for Documents of the Islamic Revolution of Iran and the Imam Musa Sadr Center.

The 34th Tehran International Book Fair will be held from 20 to 30 May 2023 at Imam Khomeini Mosque and simultaneously on ketab.ir.