2019 Asian Bookstore Forum is held in Xi'an High-tech Zone

ACCESS Newswire
11 Jul 2019, 12:31 GMT+10

Reading guides new fashion, atmosphere of literature fills Xi'an City

CHENGDU, CHINA / ACCESSWIRE / July 11, 2019 / The 2019 Asian Bookstore Forum, with the keynote of "Space Innovation * Unleashing a New Era", was inaugurated in Xi'an on July 6th, 2019.

The Asian Bookstore Forum, initiated by Yan Ji You, grew step by step and has developed into a grand cultural event since 2017. In 2017, the Asian Bookstore Forum was themed as "Ten Cities, Ten Cultural Landmarks"; in 2018, the forum used "Bookstore Symbiosis • City Aesthetics" as guidance; now at the Third Asian Bookstore Forum, Yan Ji You joined hands with Xi'an, a city blessed with both antiquities and modernity.

This forum was themed as "Space Innovation * Unleashing a New Era", covering the meanings of "future", "development", "innovation", and "cross-border".

There two key features of this forum, which can be summarized as below.

1. Colorful Activities, Heated Discussion

The 2019 Asian Bookstore Forum was hosted by the Department of Culture, Radio, Film, TV, Press and Publication of Xi'an and Xi'an High-tech Zone Management Committee, organized by Yan Ji You, and co-organized by Sanlian Lifeweek ,Openbook, Bookdao, and Context Lab. Famous writers, designers, bookstore entrepreneurs, public cultural spaces, publishing houses, and profession representatives were invited to jointly contemplate new development trends of bookstores, writers, and publishing houses and explore new vitality of culture industry.

Besides the theme forum, there were another five sub-forums, including writer forum, bookstore forum, designer forum, publisher forum, and public cultural space forum，and a Shaanxi Literature achievement-sharing session. Discussions were conducted for a whole day. In addition, there were four signing sessions of famous writers, including Wenxuan Cao, Xiaoxian Zhang, Xichuan, and Di'an.

Because of the inevitable evolution of space driven by time, from "future intelligence world" to "future unbounded world", the future of bookstores is an inevitable course with books as media and with consumers as guidance, which links up bookstore and future to create more innovative cultural spaces.

The influence of this Bookstore Forum was the reflection of the maximization of book culture and history culture, which definitely would continuously promote the development of cultural industry and allow bookstores to lead cultural constructions.

2. Bookstore Cross-border Integration, "Book-fragrant Xi'an" New Brand

"A good bookstore is the holy land where readers rest their souls, the sign of cultural inheritance, and an unique city brand......"Hongwei Lian addressed. In recent years, the number of physical bookstores in Xi'an increased from 827 in 2017 to more than 2000 at present. Xi'an jumped to the 5th in the ranking of China bookstore. Physical Bookstores revived through innovative integrating modes, including "book + coffee", "book + culture"， and"book + technology".

At this forum, joint efforts were made with big data research firms and major academic institutions to release authoritative book-related data lists, including "Xi'an Reading Portrayal", "WeRead City Reading Index". According to "WeRead City Reading Index", Xi'an was the 5th in the ranking of "Cities that loves reading the most",just after Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen. At the same time, Xi'an was the first in the ranking of "Classics Reading"and "Technology Reading".

In addition, at the awards dinner, there were four award categories, including "Writer", "Designer", "Bookstore", and "Publisher". Wenxuan Cao, Xiaoxian Zhang, Xichuan, Di'an won"2018 the Most influential Writer in Children's Literature", "2018 the Most influential Writer in Romance Literature", "2018 the Most influential Poet", and"2018 Literary Figure" respectively. As the initiator of the forum, Yan Ji You won the award of "2018 the Most Beautiful Bookstore". Other writers, bookstores, and designer also won prizes.

As introduced, Yan Ji You aimed to share industry experience, deliver vanguard thoughts, promote cultural cooperation modes and development patterns, advance development and exchange of culture industry, and foster "nationwide reading".

As the initiator of the Asian Bookstore Forum, Yan Ji You， with"Make Life Different"as the idea and physical space as the background, insists on its originality to construct a culture bridge via its own efforts, in order to continuously energize Chinese Bookstores, promote the development of bookstore industry, and explore new vitality of culture industry.