Blue Skies and Busy at the BIBF... September 3, 2015 23:47
Skies were blue the last week of August in Beijing, bluer than in Singapore which suffered some Sumatran smoke-haze. Beijingers call these skies "parade ground blue"...
We modest book publishers celebrated the fine weather by spending our time indoors at the Beijing International Book Fair. NUS Press was happy to attend as part of the Singapore national delegation, organized by the Singapore Book Publishers Association. The Singapore stand received lots of attention, both from parents looking for bilingual books for their children, and from Chinese publishers keen to reach out along the new Maritime Silk Road...
NUS Press was very happy to meet Colleagues from many Chinese and other Asian publishers.
from left: NUS Press Consulting Editor Lin Shaoyu (林少予) with Mr 文輝 湯 of Guangxi Normal University Press; Shaoyu, NUS Press Director Peter Schoppert and Ms 沂紋 郭 of China Social Sciences Press;
from left: Peter with Mr Zhou Yongkun of Yunnan University University Press; Shaoyu, Peter and Ms 宋文艳 of Xiamen University Press.
In addition to the publishers pictured above, we met representatives from : University of Tokyo Press, University of Hawaii Press, University of Hong Kong Press, Peking University Press, Foreign Language Teaching & Research Press, China National Publications Import & Export Corporation, Amazon China, China Educational Publishers Import & Export Corporation, People's Fine Arts Publishing House, among others.
There was great interest from the Chinese publishers in forging closer links with Southeast Asia, and in subjects related to China's maritime links with the region. Chinese publishers were also wishing to sell more copyrights overseas, and see if Chinese viewpoints can get more airtime in the English discourse. So with this context, you can imagine that we had plenty to discuss. Look for more news on our first translations from Chinese (forthcoming) and some Chinese editions for our books on the region.