The City of Cape Town’s libraries will participate in two major upcoming literary events – National Book Week and the Open Book Cape Town Festival.
Many of the City’s 100 libraries will be hosting events and displays ahead of and during these two annual celebrations of reading and literature.
National Book Week (2-7 September 2013), which is held to promote and embrace the value of reading, is a joint initiative between the Department of Arts and Culture and the South African Book Development Council and features a number of events, as well as reading promotion projects and corporate social investment programmes designed to instil a love of books and reading.
The Open Book Cape Town Festival (7-11 September 2013) is a literary festival showcasing the best of South African writing and has grown from humble beginnings in 2011 to featuring more than 100 authors and 100 events. It is an initiative of The Book Lounge and involves the East City precinct’s “The Fringe” venues such as the Central Library, Fugard Theatre and The Book Lounge, where most of the events take place.
In the run-up to the Open Book Cape Town Festival, the Central Library will host an attempt to break a Guinness World Record by knocking down a domino chain consisting of 2 500 books.
The current record is held by the Seattle Public Library in the United States which knocked down a chain of 2 131 books. The record-breaking attempt will be held at 09:00 on Tuesday, 27 August 2013, and members of the public are invited to watch this exciting event.
Cape Town boasts 100 libraries as well as three satellite libraries and a mobile library service.
More than 11.4 million people visited the City’s libraries during 2012 and took out 12.3 million items (of the 4.4 billion items available). Nearly 100 000 new members joined the City’s libraries during that time and 856 420 people attended 20 528 library programmes during 2012, which included reading, literacy, gender and HIV/Aids programmes as well as storytelling sessions and DVD screenings.
The City’s Library Services also have comprehensive online resources including World Book Online and Britannica Online at all libraries, as well as 668 computers available for the public to use as part of the SmartCape initiative, which provides access to the internet and word processing programs free of charge. Wireless access is also available at the Central, Harare, Fish Hoek and Bellville libraries.
Here is a list of some of the main events taking place at City libraries for National Book Week:
