Happy World Book Day! What’s World Book Day?
Let us explain. World Book Day was started by UNESCO (the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization) and is celebrated on Apr. 23 — a date chosen, according to UNESCO, to mark the day in 1616 that saw the deaths of Cervantes, Shakespeare, and Inca Garcilaso de la Vega. The event is meant to honor authors and encourage literacy. And it’s not just World Book Day. It’s also UNESCO’s Copyright Day, meant to urge implementation of copyright-protection conventions around the world.
(MORE: Ouch! Check Out the Harshest Book Review of the Year)
The U.K. and Ireland version of World Book Day is observed earlier, partly due to working around school holidays, and involves a literacy-promoting charity — as well as something the rest of the world is missing: costumes.
As the BBC recounts, the day is often marked by children dressing up as their favorite literary characters—even when those characters are only slightly book-related. In this particular complaint, the character in question is a Lego ninja—and the day ends up not so much about books after all:
There was a time when reading a book meant just that. In your head, out loud, to yourself or to a crowd. Whichever way, it was reading.
But not any more. It’s about dressing up. Or at least it’s about dressing up if you happen to be of school age and your teachers have been sucked into the literary-industrial complex of World Book Day.
Somehow we doubt that UNESCO will be adding World Literary-Industrial Complex Day to the calendar any time soon…
By Lily Rothman/ENTERTAINMENT TIME.COM
Happy World Book Day! Some Interesting Facts
In honour of World Book Day, which is being celebrated today in the UK, we thought we’d delve into the interesting stories and trivia hiding behind some of the most popular and successful books ever written. So, here goes…
The biggest-selling book written in English is Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities. Dickens’s 1859 novel about the French Revolution (the ‘two cities’ of the title are London and Paris) is in many ways his most untypical book: of the fifteen novels he wrote (including the unfinished The Mystery of Edwin Drood), it is arguably the least comic (with Hard Times not far ahead of it for laughs). Since no small part of Dickens’s perennial popularity is surely his genius for comedy, along with his portrayals of Victorian London, it seems odd that this novel – which is largely set in Paris – should be his most popular. But it is, in terms of sales: an estimated 200 million copies have been sold over the last 150-odd years, making it the bestselling book in the English language.
The second and third bestselling books in English are both by J. R. R. Tolkien. Yes, The Lord and the Rings and The Hobbit are, respectively, the second and third biggest-selling books written originally in the English language, making Tolkien’s combined sales from these two books (if you follow Tolkien’s lead and see The Lord of the Rings as a single novel, rather than a trilogy) an estimated 250 million. Not bad, considering that The Hobbit started life one day when Tolkien was bored marking university exam papers at Oxford…
There are numerous bestselling novels which are longer than War and Peace. Although War and Peace is famous principally for being such a long novel, there are many classics which surpass it for their sheer word count. Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy, Samuel Richardson’s Clarissa, and Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time/Remembrance of Things Past are among the most famous novels which out-War and Peace War and Peace. But Tolstoy produced the definitive ‘long novel’. His original title for the novel was All’s Well That Ends Well (same as the Shakespeare play). Woody Allen once said: ‘I just speed-read War and Peace. It’s about some Russians.’
Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar has sold around 30 million copies. This classic children’s book was originally called ‘A Week with Willi Worm’, with the main protagonist being a bookworm.
The Harry Potter book series is the biggest selling series of novels ever published. J. K. Rowling’s seven novels about the boy wizard have sold around 450 million copies collectively, and have helped to popularise the word ‘muggle’ … although the word ‘muggle’ dates back, with various meanings, to the thirteenth century. (It originally meant ‘a tail resembling that of a fish’.)
The first official World Book Day was celebrated on 23 April 1995. This is partly because Miguel de Cervantes and William Shakespeare both died on this date, 23 April 1616 (although, in point of fact, Cervantes had died the day before). William Wordsworth would also die on 23 April, 1850 – St. George’s Day. Indeed, a truly international World Book Day is still celebrated on 23 April every year.
We hope you enjoyed our special World Book Day facts! Have a enjoyable and literary day, and go lose yourself in a good book this day of all days…
World Book Day: What does reading mean to you?
Hopefully you know that today is World Book Day. And if you don’t, then you should. Because it is a celebration of reading; one of the most enjoyable things in the world to do… And something that everyone needs to do more of. Reading is something I feel quite passionately about so, if you don’t feel the same, probably best to switch off now.
World Book Day is now in its 16th year, and is the opportunity for children of all ages to come together to appreciate reading in every which way they can.
The very heart of it is about encouraging children to explore the pleasure of reading, by providing them with the opportunity to have a book of their own; thanks to National Book Tokens Ltd. But, thinking about World Book Day, got me considering books in general and the bigger picture.
The key thing for me is the books themselves, I love everything about them. I love going to the library, browsing the shelves, choosing the ones I want to read, and then checking them out on my library card. I love old books, I love new books, I love long books, I love short books.
But libraries all across the UK are closing all the time, and these are the cheapest and best way for children to be able to explore the concept of reading. So if this kind of facility is dying, how can we expect them to really get pleasure from books in the same way that we did when we were growing up?
It makes me sad to think that they might never get involved in a Famous Five adventure, want to be a member of the Saddle Club, or laugh themselves silly at The Twits.
I can imagine that most of you, by now, are thinking that I have missed a fairly important point… Digital. Kindle. E-Book. Whatever else you might want to call it. I have not missed it, or forgotten it, I just don’t think it is the same. Happy to discuss, but prepare yourself for a healthy debate! That is only when it comes to reading books though.
In other areas of my life I will embrace digital. Particularly when it comes to the news, which is another one of my favourite things; and brings me back to what I am probably supposed to be discussing on the Speed blog!
Reading for me is not just about books. I will quite literally devour anything. And that includes news. Which is so critical in the PR and communications industry. I don’t think anyone could do this job without being one step ahead of the news at all times, particularly in the corporate team. We need to know everything that is going on with everything, in order to relate to our clients, their business issues, the markets they operate in and so on…
So if you want to work in corporate PR, I would suggest you do the following:
- Read the news
- Read the news
- Read the news
And if you ever want to work with me, I would suggest you do the following:
- Read a book (not a Kindle)!
by lauraimregi
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