The Taiwan Pavilion at the upcoming Frankfurt Book Fair 2019 is to feature literary works on marine culture and preservation as well as a section dedicated to comic books.
The Frankfurt Book Fair, the largest book fair in the world that takes place annually in Frankfurt, Germany, will be held this year from Oct. 16 to 20, during which the Taiwan Pavilion will be called “TAIWAN: Island of Amazing Stories.”
Ministry of Culture official Chen Ying-fang (陳瑩芳) on Wednesday said the ministry, which organized the Taiwan Pavilion along with Taipei Book Fair Foundation, has raised the budget for translating Chinese-language literature into other languages, and has invited foreign translators working on Taiwanese literary works to Taiwan for exchange and communication.
Photo: CNA
Two Taiwanese authors, Syaman Rapongan and Liao Hung-chi (廖鴻基), both devoted writers of ocean literature, have been invited to the fair to present the breadth and depth of Taiwan’s ocean literature, while a designated section in the pavilion will display cross-disciplinary books published last year and this year that tell wonderful stories about the natural environment in Taiwan, the ministry said.
Rapongan, one of the most well-known writers of ocean literature in Taiwan, said that besides depicting the complex historical relationships between humans and water, another major theme in his works is “anti-discrimination” against Tao Aborigines on the island, which distinguishes him from other ocean writers.
Liao, an important force behind Taiwan’s marine ecology conservation movement, has spent several years working on coastal fishing boats and incorporating the life of fishermen and their observation of the sea into his literary works.
A section dedicated to Taiwanese manga will be showcased for the first time, featuring images and concepts of the“forest”that will be contrasted with the ocean, according to Rex How (郝明義), Locus Publishing Co chairman and curator of the manga section.
Taiwanese comic artists Chang Sheng (常勝), Hom Weng (翁瑜鴻) and Honey Chen (陳漢玲) have also been invited as speakers to introduce the diversity of materials in Taiwanese manga at the fair, according to the ministry.
Chang is known for the fantasy nature of and vivid characters in his works, while Weng has won the Golden Comic Award — the most prestigious award for comics in Taiwan — multiple times and is also known for her previous work Big City, Little Things (大城小事).
Chen, a young comic artist who often vividly role-plays her own characters at book signing events, will attend the fair this year both as a comic artist and professional cosplayer.
A total of 117 publishers will be featured in the Taiwan Pavilion, representing 832 paper and digital publications, the foundation said, adding that several interactive events and international license matchmaking events would also be held during the fair.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching