Speech as the guest of honour at the SINO-ASEAN Children’s Publishing Forum in Nannin, Guanxi, China on 26th October 2019.
My appeal to the Chinese Publishers who are pioneers in Children’s books, and also to other publishers of ASEAN and South Asian Countries and all IBBY National Sections around the world, is to actively participate in exchanging cultural values through books. One of IBBY’s missions is to promote international understanding through children’s books. So, in order to achieve this, you need to both give and take.
But so far, what I have experienced is only take, and difficulty in giving. So, my humble appeal at this great forum is to consider not only giving and what and how to get from others. GIVE and TAKE, in commercial terms ‘SELLING’ and ‘BUYING’ both have to be promoted to move ahead with better understanding and to be sustainable.
Today, I am so happy than any other day in China participating at this event. Can you guess why ? It is the message that I received from Jiely Publishing House for me to bring three selected books which we have published in Sri Lanka to see whether they can promote them. I do not worry whether those books will be selected or not. I am happy that I was given a chance to try in this market. It is a great opportunity that you extended. They can review those books, they can propose to change here and there, they can propose to change illustrations. Whatever it is, we would really appreciate it.
As the President of IBBY Sri Lanka Section, my mission is to develop the children’s book sector in our country. The Chinese book standards are the benchmark which I have introduced to our country.
Sri Lanka was a colony of three Western Powers since 1505 to 1948. After achieving independence in 1948, until 1977 it was a golden period for local intellectuals to bring out their creative work. Many books were created to influence local society. Some of those books were so popular that they were translated into many other languages, including Chinese and Japanese.
During that period, translations of Russian literature dominated our society and influenced us to a great extent. Chinese literature was popular among urban communities. In the mid 1950s, Chinese books, especially children’s books, were translated into the Sinhala language, printed and published in Peiking (now Beijing). Those books are still in demand and reprinted locally in Sri Lanka. Among them, The Red Lantern of Su Tong is still popular, as well as many other Chinese Children’s books.
From the years 1977 to 2007, attention to literature was very low due to state policies driven by the extreme open economic system. It effected our society in a negative manner. However, since 2010, the trend has improved and we as writers and publishers are heavily involved in re- correcting and building social values through literature. It is a strenuous exercise but we believe that we are on the right track. Since 2014, we have got in touch with Chinese, Indian and some Western Publishing Houses. At present, we are working closely on various types of collaborations. We have also obtained licenses from the Ministry of Education for 24 translated Chinese Children’s books, recommendiing them for use in school libraries.
So, there is great potential to grow. We, as the publishing community of Sri Lanka, very much appreciate the Chinese Publishing Houses’ interest in collaborating on their wonderful creations with the societies along the Belt and Road.
As the Sri Lanka Section of IBBY, our effort is to encourage children to read books and to develop a Book Reading Culture. So, we need more and more books for them! We need to reward good readers and create a well-read society which can contribute to a harmonious, peaceful world.
I wish the Sino-ASEAN Children’s Publishing Forum, the Sino-ASEAN Publishing Rights Licensing and Trading Convention and Jieli ASEAN Children’s Book Alliance great success!
1.4th Asia and Oceania IBBY Regional Meeting
The 4th Asian and Oceania IBBY Regional Conference was held at Shangri-La Hotel in Xi’an, China from 26-28 September 2019. The meeting was hosted by CBBY—the Chinese section of IBBY.
Out of 16 IBBY sections in the Asia/Oceania region, representatives from Afghanistan, Japan, China, Indonesia, India, Iran, Korea, Cambodia, Malaysia, Mongolia, Thailand and Sri Lanka participated. Members of the IBBY Executive Committee from Switzerland, South Africa, Russia, USA and UK also participated at the meeting.
It was decided to host the next IBBY Regional Meeting, the 5th Asia and Oceania Meeting, in Sri Lanka in 2021.
2. World Literacy Day Programme
At the request of the International Literacy Association (ILA), children from Sri Lanka received the opportunity to be filmed reading the Childrens’ Rights to Read. This was as part of a video recorded in different countries in different languages, to be screened at the World Congress on International Literacy Day on 8 September.
Forty one Sri Lankan children and youth aged 5 to 20 years participated in 2 groups. One group comprising 24 members of child and youth clubs in Moneragala recorded the Rights in Sinhala; the other group comprising 17 students from 2 schools in Mullaitivu recorded the Rights in Tamil.
The recruitment of children and youth, training them and filming the video clips was done by the staff of Abhimana Sri Lanka, one of SLBBY’s organisational members.
3.World Children’s Day Programme
Sri Lanka celebrated World Children’s Day this year on 1st October. The main event was held in Matale organised by the District Secretariat under the theme of A Friendly Nation for the Victory of Children.
A Story-telling Programme by SLBBY was held at the National Youth Centre, Maharagama. This full day programme was organised by the Independent Television Network (ITN) and Lak Handa Radio.
4. Donation of Wordless Books
The Sri Lankan Board on Books for Young people (SLBBY) donated 232 copies of the wordless book created by Deepthi Horagoda, for use as book therapy for the children and youth affected by the Easter Sunday bomb blasts. The books were handed over to the Archbishop’s representative at Archbishop’s House on October 1st 2019—World Children’s Day.
5. Guru Gedara Literary Awards
Guru Gedara awards are dedicated to reward the creative writing of teachers and students in all categories of Children’s Books, including fiction and non-fiction. The 10th award ceremony was held on Teachers’ Day, 5th October 2019 at the Mahaweli Centre, Colombo. SLBBY contributed by presenting 30 awards and 60 certificates. We will also be organising a workshop to improve the skills of writers and illustrators, aiming at the 2020 programme.
6. Literature and Art Festival For Children And Youth 2020
The Literature and Art Festival will be held on June 5th, 6th and 7th 2020. SLBBY is now calling for manuscripts of children’s and young adults’storybooks and applications for Best Produced Children’s Books in 2019, to be judged and awarded prizes at the Literature and Art Festival in 2020.
7. Sino-ASEAN Children’s Publishing Forum 2019
The Sino-ASEAN Publishing Rights Licensing and Trading Convention, and establishing the Jieli ASEAN Children’s Book Alliance will be held from 25th–28th October 2019 in Guanxi, South China at Nanning Crown Plaza. The SLBBY President has been invited to participate at this event as the Guest of Honour. Jieli Publishing Hose is a member of the Chinese Board on Books for Young People.
8.වචන රහිත ළමා පොත මාතර රුහුණු පොත් වසන්තය ප්රදර්ශණයේ දී ශ්රී ලංකා ළමා සහ යොවුන් පොත් මණ්ඩලය වෙතින්පාසල් සහ මහජන පුස්තකාල වෙත පරිත්යාග කෙරෙනලංකාවේ පළමු වතාවට ප්රකාශයට පත් කළ, දීප්ති හොරගොඩ විසින් නිර්මාණය කළ, වචන රහිත ළමා පොත ඔක්තෝම්බර් 23 සිට 28 දක්වා දිනවලමාතර රුහුණු පොත් වසන්තය ප්රදර්ශණයේ දී ‘රීඩ්ප්ලස්’ කුටියේ දී ලබා ගත හැක.