April 23 is UNESCO World Book Day – and just because the Global Voices team loves blogs, doesn’t mean we have forgotten books! In fact, because we think reading literature is such an enjoyable way to learn about another culture, we have a fun challenge for all Global Voices contributors and readers, and bloggers everywhere.
The Global Voices Book Challenge is as follows:
1) Read a book from a country whose literature you have never read anything of before.
2) Write a blog post about it during the week of April 23.
3) Tag your posts with #gvbook09 so we can find your posts.
Once you have read your book (and written a post!) let us know – we’d love to discover what you learned on your literary expedition.
*** UPDATE: Sylwia Presley has rounded up some of the first responses to the challenge in world blogs: Read Your Way Around the World: Book Challenge Roundup
Any language is welcome, the book challenge has been translated into more than 10 different languages here.
If you would like some ideas for what you should be reading, see our favorite literature posts on Global Voices from the past year.
Our favorite posts about literature on Global Voices
25 Apr – World Book Day: Women's lives in the mirror of their men
23 Apr - Guatemala: Collaborative Publishing of the Book TRANS 2.0
14 Apr – Brazil: Indian writers and poets on the blogosphere
23 May – Cuba: Interview with Blogger Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo
17 May – Angola: Celebrating Angolan Women's Day with poetry
12 May - Kenya: Language Dilemma For Kenyan Poet Bloggers
12 Feb – Bangladesh: Books By Bloggers
28 Jan – Egypt: “Kleenex” Literature at Cairo International Bookfair
17 Nov – Japan: Japanese Language in the Age of English
24 Oct – Talking to Guyanese litblogger Charmaine Valere
01 Oct – Japan: Being a Geisha in the blog age
24 Sep – Lusosphere: Saramago, 85 years, Nobel Laureate, Blogger
09 Sep – Bulgaria, Macedonia: Rapprochement Through Literature
28 Oct – Angola: On the mermaid Kianda and other mythical beings
17 Aug – Palestine: Is literature in Gaza dead?
04 Aug – Russia: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
21 Jul – Ecuador: Interest in Literature Continues
14 Jul – Western Sahara: Poetry and Spanish – The Permanent Links
15 Jun – Kyrgyzstan: A Nation Is Grieving for Chingiz Aitmatov
If you have ideas for anything else that should be included on this page, please email Ayesha Saldanha or Laura Vidal.
