FIL Guadalajara 2025 - Barcelona City of Honour

FIL Guadalajara

Barcelona will be the guest of honour at the 39th edition of the Guadalajara International Book Fair (FIL) in 2025, the year in which the city will be celebrating a decade since UNESCO declared it a City of Literature, in 2015. This will be a very important event for the city and its literature, because the Guadalajara International Book Fair (FIL) is one of the biggest literary fairs and festivals in the world, each year receiving more than 800,000 visitors.

We’re announcing our presence with Mercè Rodoreda, under the slogan “Vindran les flors” (The Flowers will come). Flowers as a link with Guadalajara, known as “The city of roses”, and as a symbol of our Sant Jordi. The flowers will come because we talk about books as living things. Because literature in Barcelona blossoms each day, and never stops. We are interested in the idea of cycles, of continuity, which can help us understand Barcelona's relationship with literature over the years. Also the years of exile, during which Mexico became a land of refuge, or the boom years, when Barcelona was filled with Latin American literature.

We want to tell these and many other stories that are linked to a city that is the publishing capital of Catalan and Spanish language literature, an undisputed reference in the Latin American market. We celebrate books every day, through a unique network of libraries and book stores, an integral part of Barcelona's cultural fabric. Barcelona is home to the biggest publishing groups, and is an ever-growing source of independent publishers, both large and small. Literary agencies, printers, distributors... The book sector plays a very important role in the city. Guadalajara will give us the opportunity to talk about this, also through our authors, translators and illustrators. In 2025, the flowers will come.