Uday K Chakraborty Runs Into Scotch-Swilling Publishers,

Ever since 1949, after a 200-year hiatus, publishers from around the world have been coming to Frankfurt in increasing numbers. Its all there, as they say. If you need a book distributor in the Polish hinterland, Frankfurt is the place to find him. If you want to buy the Catalan rights for a Norman Mailer novel, you can sit down and hammer out an agreement on the spot. The Frankfurt Book Fair is for forging contacts and making things happen. For many, after months of drawnout negotiations across the Atlantic, the endgame takes place here, face to face.

The site of the fair is vast. Huge halls house the various displays and exhibition themes. The primary site is Hall Five, where the great and humble of international publishing rub elbows along labyrinthine corridors, and where countries from Argentina to Zimbabwe strut their literary credentials.

 

On the opening day, armies of publishers and booksellers march purposefully to the Fair in the brisk autumn air. Colourful banners are stretched across main thoroughfares, announcing everything from childrens books to L Ron Hubbards Dianetics. For the veterans, Frankfurt-in-October may simply be another ho-hum, here-we-go-again gathering, but for the first timer its awesome. Theres plenty of trash on the shelves, no doubt. But theres enough heavy-duty New Writing to send you into numinous shivers too.

Amidst the hustle-bustle and big business, it is lovely to get lost on purpose, to follow temptations with abandon, and to sink into the luxurious realm of books. It is impossible not to look and browse you can end up spending hours