On September 19th, the Ministry of Culture invited the Syrian public and private publishing houses to participate in the Syrian Book Fair 2021, which will be hosted by Al-Assad National Library on October 26th.

During the meeting of the General Supervisory Committee of the exhibition to discuss plans and ways to make this fair a success, Minister of Culture Dr. Lubana Mushouh said that the Syrian Book Fair is not a substitute for the Al-Assad Library International Book Fair, but rather a response to the desire of readers, intellectuals and publishing houses to hold another book fair.

The Minister of Culture pointed out that the aim of the fair is to assess Syrian books and present them to the public.

Dr. Mushouh stressed the need for partnership to work with ministries and concerned authorities, to carefully select books and to simulate all fields. 

The committee also discussed the fair’s logo, the accompanying cultural program, and the visual and advertising vision.

O. al-Mohammad

Damascus (ST): Transferring the racist Zionist ideology to young generations and spreading its poison is an endeavor that the Israeli occupation authorities have worked on since the formation of this entity with the aim of sowing hatred against Arabs and Palestinians and giving legitimacy to the perpetration of massacres against Arabs and Palestinians.

The book (Letters of Hatred from Talmud Racism to Racism in Education), by researcher Ahmed Raja Orabi, sheds light on the efforts of the Zionist leaders to perpetuate their ideology separated from reality through methods of work and actual application on the ground.

In presenting the book, Dr. Khalaf Al-Muftah, director of the Al-Quds International Foundation, which issued it, refers to the educational discourse, both religious and cognitive, in the Zionist entity, and its rejection of the idea of accepting the other in light of its racist policies, including education.

Book Review

Damascus (ST):  Man has known music for ages, deriving it from the elements of nature. He tried to imitate it in response to his innate desires to express himself and his feelings. But the most prominent breakthrough that music knew was with the civilization of Mesopotamia, where it flourished to become an independent art and science linked with many other arts and sciences. According to the book issued electronically by the Syrian General Book Authority entitled “The Functional Role of Music in the Civilization of Mesopotamia during the Old and Medieval Bronze Ages 3500/1600 BC,” archaeological excavations in many Mesopotamian sites revealed large numbers of evidence that document the  prevailing musical culture in the country during those eras. The book, written by researcher Ataa Raad Abu Al-Jadayel, sheds light on the motives and reasons that led to the development of music in that early period in the history of the Mesopotamian civilization, revealing its role and the extent of its integration into the details of daily life.

Damascus (ST):  The story of the British cruise ship Princess of Diamonds, which was considered early last year the third epicenter of the outbreak of the Corona virus in the world, served as the inspiration that prompted writer Iman Sharbati to write her novel (Caroline).

The novel includes many social and life cases in the Arab world and the world that appear through a cruise ship traveling at sea carrying hundreds of people and subjected to quarantine due to the infection of many of them with the Corona virus.

In an individual initiative that aims at encouraging reading on paper, Syrian expatriates in the United Arab Emirates Hassan Al-Bahri has turned his own home library into a public library.

Al-Bahri told SANA about the details of this initiative, saying that he started to organize a small library in his house ten years ago. The library contained a limited number of books he had selected during his visits to libraries. Gradually, he collected many important books that inspired him to allocate an area of 110 square meters of his house for a public library which people can visit either to read or borrow books.

"I wanted to create an opportunity to enhance culture and literature away from financial benefits with the aim  of reviving the habit of reading on paper which has become rare under the current technological developments," Al-Bahri made it clear.