Yesterday (March 29) saw the opening of the 38th edition of the Kuala Lumpur International Book fair, which will be on until April 7, at the Putra World Trade Centre.
With the hashtag MalaysiaMembaca (Malaysia reads), it literally means to promote reading, which is a tall order in this Internet surfing and social media era. It is the precursor to Unesco’s World Book Day on April 23, which will see more than 100 countries participating.
The World Book Day is inspired by the Catalonian custom el dia del llibre, a festival where couples exchange books as gifts. Approximately 1.8 million books worth €25 million (RM116 million) are expected to be sold on the day.
The event is also an appreciation of authors. Good writers have furthered the social advancement and cultural progress of humanity, be it in spiritual terms or economics, politics, education, ethics, law, sciences, mathematics, comparative religion, philosophy and literature.
Indeed, April 23 was picked because it marks the anniversary of the death of many eminent Western writers such as Miguel de Cervantes and William Shakespeare. The date also marks the birth of Nobel laureates Halldór Laxness and Vladimir Nabokov.
“A chief glory of every people arises from its authors,” so said Dr Samuel Johnson, arguably the most distinguished littérateur in English history.
French writer and historian François-Marie Arouet or his nom de plume Voltaire once said that “the whole of the known universe, with the exception of the savage races, is governed by books alone”. Voltaire’s remark was not without exaggeration and he marshalled many witty examples to illustrate it. The 18th century Enlightenment writer pointed out that the Islamic civilisation is governed by the Quran, the Chinese civilisation by the Analects, Hindu civilisation (the Vedas), and the pre-Islamic Persia by the Avesta.
In saying that the Quran governed Islamic civilisation — this is rooted in the first Divine Order to the Prophet Muhammad, who was told to “Read!” (Iqra’).
Islam is mandated to be based on the harmony of revelation with intelligence, perusal, thorough study, profound thinking, in-depth investigation, research and exploration on significant human issues. Such a culture gave birth to the leading scientists and innovators of their time. Muslim civilisation can proudly name hundreds of thinkers and discoverers among its famous sons and daughters, including Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi, a geographer and mathematician, from whose name the word “algorithm” came from.
To encourage Malaysians to read more, the government should promote the Putrajaya Library as a research and referral centre with a collection of books to add value to the federal administrative centre. It should be benchmarked against the National Diet Library of Tokyo and Kyoto, Japan, or the Library of Congress, Washington DC. The ultimate goal may be to position it as the greatest library or resource centre for the Malay Archipelago.
DR MOHD SANI BADRON
Principal fellow/director, Centre for Economics and Social Studies, Institute of Islamic Understanding Malaysia