August 1, 2007 Center for the Book Publishes Bilingual Volume on Reading Promotion in the U.K., Russia and U.S.

The Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, along with the British Council and the Pushkin Library Foundation in Russia, has recently published “Building Nations of Readers: Experience, Ideas, Examples,” a handbook on reading promotion. Produced in cooperation with the Section on Reading of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA), the illustrated 261-page volume, written in both English and Russian, describes reading promotion and reader development in the United Kingdom, Russia and the United States. Center for the Book Director John Y. Cole and Valeria D. Stelmakh, both former chairs of the IFLA Section on Reading, edited and compiled the book, as well as wrote the survey articles on the U.S. and Russia, respectively. Tom Palmer, a freelance reader development consultant in the U.K., wrote the British survey article. Other contributors include Eugenia V. Kulikova, deputy director of the Russian State Children’s Library, and Gwynneth Evans, former director-general of National and International Programs at the National Library of Canada and current chair of the IFLA Section on Reading. Each of the three country essays combines the history of reading promotion with information about reading research, trends and challenges, and descriptions of more than a dozen current reading promotion projects. Posters, bookmarks and other graphic materials depicting projects in all three countries are featured in a special section; most are reproduced in color. A limited supply of single copies of “Building Nations of Readers” is available without charge from the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress. Requests should be made by e-mail to cfbook@loc.gov. The Center for the Book’s reading promotion partners network began in 1987. Now numbering more than 80, the partners are mostly national or international organizations that promote books, reading, literacy or libraries and are interested in co-sponsoring promotion projects with the Center for the Book and other organizations. For more information on the center’s partnerships and reading promotion efforts, visit www.loc.gov/cfbook/.