Quenching the thirst for knowledge through books

Sharjah - With its longsighted vision, Sharjah today is leading the cultural advancement of the Arab world, based on a worldwide inter-cultural, knowledge-based approach

The story of Sharjah's momentous cultural experience began more than four decades ago, inspired by the vision of His Highness Sheikh Dr. Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, Member of the Supreme Council and Ruler of Sharjah, who realised the great value of culture and books at a very early age.
In a ground-breaking achievement, Sharjah has recently been crowned with the title of the World Book Capital for 2019 by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), an honour that comes in recognition of the emirate's 40 years of hard work and efforts to realise the vision of the Ruler. Over the years, Sharjah has steadily established itself as global cultural destination for intellectuals, writers, thinkers, and publishers.
With its longsighted vision, Sharjah today is leading the cultural advancement of the Arab world, based on a worldwide inter-cultural, knowledge-based approach.
The story began when the late Sheikh Mohammed bin Saqr Al Qasimi dedicated a gold dagger to his son, His Highness Sheikh Dr. Sultan Al Qasimi, who later mortgaged the dagger to buy books. With his thirst for knowledge, His Highness realised his dream of creating a culture-based capital, culminating in Sharjah being named the World Book Capital for 2019.
Sharjah's image is reinforced through its unprecedented projects and pilot action programmes - since the inauguration of the first edition of the Sharjah International Book Fair (SIBF) in1982, it has grown over 35 years to become one of the top book fairs in the world.
Over this period, SIBF turned from a simple tent where a few Arab publishers and readers gathered, into a literary festival that annually attracts more than two million visitors from various corners of the globe and brings together over 1,500 publishing houses from many sisterly and friendly countries.
Besides SIBF and Sharjah's influential cultural presence, the emirate of Sharjah is proud to be home to seven public libraries offering various sources of knowledge and books covering different genres of literature. The emirate offers a perfect environment for people to begin their journey into the world of reading through 600,000 books, periodicals, documents, manuscripts and other sources of knowledge in Arabic, English and several other languages.
sherouk@khaleejtimes.com