For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, the São Paulo International Book Biennial is back in person this week, giving birth to debates on inclusion. With lectures that address the representation of people with disabilities, blacks, indigenous people and the LGBTQIA+ community, the event contributes to leverage the literary market, which had positive results in the first half of the year.
According to Dante Cid, president of the National Union of Book Publishers (SNEL), the event takes place amid the rising trend of interest in reading: “With the pandemic, people have returned to the habit of reading as a leisure option and now this is turning into a massive presence at book fairs.” According to the Book Retail Panel in Brazil, produced by Nielsen BookScan and released by SNEL, from January to May of this year there was a 12.35% increase in revenue from the publishing market when compared to the same period in 2021.
The positive moment for the sector opens space for plural authors and readers. For Samuel Gomes, author of the book “Saved in the closet” and speaker who will be at the Bienal to talk about LGBTQIA+ representation, this is an opportunity to generate structural changes. “The resumption of face-to-face events with this focus more on diversity, praising non-standard authors, is revolutionary. So it’s important to have this also in the Bienal de São Paulo as a focus, not only as a wave, but as the construction of the society we want.”
This struggle for the ideal society has long faced huge inequalities. A contemporary literature study group at the University of Brasília (UnB) analyzed 258 novels published by three major publishers between 1990 and 2004. From this, it was possible to conclude that 93.9% of the published authors were white. For Samuel, who makes up the smallest percentage, as a black writer, literature itself can be a way of changing the publishing market. “The book helps blacks and non-blacks to understand how structural racism works within people’s lives.”
But this change against prejudice shouldn’t just be on the shelves, it also needs to come from the readers. Lawyer and literary influencer Pedro Pacífico, known on social media as BookSter, daily produces content to influence his followers to establish conscious reading habits: “The good reader is not the one who only reads a lot of books. For me, the role of a good reader begins even before reading, which is when choosing a book, thinking about whether or not he chooses with the idea of representation.”
This search for inclusion through literature can be a way of freeing oneself from one’s own prejudices and understanding oneself in society by understanding that, like the characters, people can be different. “I think if it weren’t for the books, maybe today I would still be in the closet and suffering with who I really am,” says BookSter, who came out as gay on social media a year and a half ago.
Changes like this, which often happen from the inside out of people, can have an even greater reach. The author of the best seller “Ideas to postpone the end of the world”, Ailton Krenak, gives visibility to indigenous and environmental causes around the world. This book alone has already been translated into 11 languages and there will be another one in December.
“When someone reads me in Japan, Holland or Norway, they are not reading representation, I think they are getting in touch with other worldviews, with plural literatures. I am more interested in the plurality of narratives than in the idea of representativeness,” says Krenak
Also addressing these themes in his participation in the São Paulo Book Biennial, the author recalls that “diversity is good, because it is a plural mirror”. “It’s not just Narciso who sees himself in the mirror. In addition to Narcissus, other invisible people can imagine themselves as characters or sympathizers in some story. That’s where I think these diversities of gender, race and unique experiences are found.”
Source: CNN Brasil
