At London Book Fair: Brexit and Creative Industry Funding – Publishing Perspectives

Rosie Goldsmith, a journalist and director of the sponsoring European Literature Network, chaired the panel and began by reminding the audience that a survey made several years ago of workers among the United Kingdoms creative industries found as many as 96 percent of the respondents saying they favored the country remaining in the European Union.

Brexit has changed our lives, Goldsmith said. We wont just be whingeing here. Well try to come up with how we can collaborate better and create literary cultural hubs.

Panelists included:

Mathias Rambaud provided a PowerPoint presentation onthe British book market and how Europe, prior to Brexit, had provided translation funding.

Some 200,000 books are published yearly in the United Kingdom, which makes it the third-largest market worldwide. By contrast, roughly 100,000 books are published yearly in France, although both countries have approximately the same population, around 67 million. This is explained by exports from the UK which represent 60 percent of all revenue, whereas in France exports represent 17.5 percent of all revenue. However, only 5.6 percent of books in the UK are translations while in France 16 percent of books are translations. Until recently French was the number one language for translation fiction sales in the UK, but Japanese has just overtaken French.

The United Kingdom was part of the Creative Europe program until 2020. The withdrawal from the European Union resulted in a significant decrease in funding for translated literature, Rambaud said, describing additional funding that had been available, provided by the French Institute and the Centre National du Livre.

On a brighter note, Rambaud said his work with the European Union National Institutes for Culture in London means trying to develop sustainable and long-running projects in the United Kingdom. One of these includestheEuropean Writers Festival, which grew out of the European Writers Tour that was created in 2017. This years festival will be held on May 20 and 21 at the British Library and will feature 30 European writers in partnership with EUNIC London, and the European Literature Network.

The United Kingdom could have remained part of Creative Europe despite leaving the European Union, according to Alexandra Bchler. She pointed to the examples of Norway and Iceland, both of which are participants in Creative Europe while non-EU members.

At Literature Across Frontiers, which is based in Wales, Bchler said, All projects are coordinated with partners. We advocate for literary translation because you cant have exchange without translation. What we do has been diminished because we dont have access to funding. [With Brexit], we ended up with a trade deal that didnt make any provision for the creative sector.

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At London Book Fair: Brexit and Creative Industry Funding - Publishing Perspectives