What is the Campus Book Festival?
Organised in collaboration with student organisations, local publishers and University of Malta Departments, the Campus Book Festival is an annual festival event usually held on Campus. This year, a programme of cultural events curated specifically for an audience of university students and the wider public has been put together, but it is taking place entirely online for the very first time between Wednesday, March 24 and Friday. March 26. We’ll be streaming the entire programme to be viewed from wherever you wish on www.ktieb.org.mt and the National Book Council Facebook page.
Where can books be purchased?
Despite the online switch, the Festival is still hosting launches and presentations of exciting new titles of literary fiction, translated literature and nonfiction by some of Malta’s leading publishers. These include the widely anticipated second volume of memoirs by the 2020 National Book Prize Lifetime Achievement Award-winning author Dr Alfred Sant, Confessions of a European Maltese – The Middle Years 1975-1992 (2021). All participating publishers are offering discounts on many titles on their websites which can also be viewed at our dedicated page for exhibitors.
Who is this year’s special guest?
Mark Doty, the acclaimed American poet and memoirist, will be participating in a book-club session with University students lead by Dr Mario Aquilina and centred on his memoir Firebird (HarperCollins, 1999) on Thursday, March 25. Doty, who is the award-winning author of nine volumes of poetry, three memoirs and essay collections, will be returning on Friday, March 26 for an extensive interview with Head of English Department at UM Prof. James Corby to discuss his literary and non-literary output more broadly. Doty was the first American to win the T.S. Eliot Prize in the U.K in 1995, and in 2008 he won the National Book Award for the book Fire to Fire: New and Selected Poems (HarperCollins, 2008).
Do people need to register or pay to attend the festival?
All festival events, including book launches and discussions with the participation of local and international writers and researchers, are registration-free and will be streaming free of charge at various times on the National Book Council Facebook page and website www.ktieb.org.mt.
Follow these pages for more information on the 2021 Campus Book Festival programme.
You only need to register for the Friday, March 26 Open Mic event organised in collaboration with Inizjamed – don’t forget to do so if you’d like to share any kind of poetry, story, song or stand-up!
National Book Council team