“Inclusion can sometimes be jarring”: new direction for the Toronto Book Fair

The next Toronto Book Fair will take place from February 27 to March 3. The event will give pride of place to debates around the annual theme, inclusion, in a definition that is undoubtedly less smooth than that to which the general public is accustomed.

By entrusting the honorary presidency to the author and activist Djemila Benhabib, the new director of the Book Fair, Eunice Éboué, wanted to invite the debate: inclusion is an issue that sometimes can shake things upshe explains.

The writer of My life against the Koran et Islamophobia, my eyewill be present for the event and will engage in a major interview on Sunday morning. Before that, several round tables will be sure to spark discussion. There will be discussions around the politically correct in school libraries, Friday afternoon, from cancel culture and those excluded from inclusion or on the theme of inclusive writing, ban it or make it compulsory?on Saturday afternoon.

In addition to these meetings which promise to be lively, there are authors from Ontario and the rest of Canada who will come to meet their audiences. Among the guests who have confirmed their presence, we can note Sylvie Bérard, Louis-Karl Picard-Sioui and the Frenchwoman Kiyémis.

Make the event more visible

Since the start of her mandate, Eunice Éboué has worked to raise awareness of the Book Fair in the community, among young people and seniors alike. She is notably at the origin of the creation of a monthly reading club which reaches out to readers across the metropolis.

The general director follows in the footsteps of her predecessors: we are still talking about an organization that is 32 years old, so that means that I am not inventing the wheel, we just had to improve the good things that were already in placeshe explains.

A meeting which is taking place for the fourth consecutive year at the University of French Ontario. The rector of the establishment, Normand Labrie, is pleased to bring together the different generations of Torontonians within its walls: there are school students, seniors, people from underrepresented groups who will be there before adding that for him, allow this interaction between different perspectives is a central mission of the university.

Reading tips

The Franco-Toronto literary community is also impatiently awaiting this moment. The writer Gabriel Osson is very involved in the organization of the event and Ariane Matte, another local figure, does not miss a single edition: I come as an author, as a reader and a member of the public, but also as a mother who raises her children in French and all that makes me happy to be at the Book Fair.

In order to wait until the opening of the event, Eunice Éboué gives some reading tips: Celine in Congo by Aristotle Kavungu (ed. Boréal) because it is a book that shakes up the lines of inclusion and The City of Kali by Sherman Sezibera (ed. Land of Welcome) because it is a story of resilience and rebirth.

Two titles that can be found on sale at the show, among hundreds of others. Franco-Ontarian publishing houses will be present throughout the weekend to sell their works and they will highlight their new releases during a public presentation on Sunday afternoon. The opportunity to stock up to get through the winter or prepare for a literary summer.