Lviv, as a UNESCO City of Literature, will be the guest of honour at the Gdańsk Book Fair (Gdańskie Targi Książki), which will take place from 11 to 13 September at the European Solidarity Centre in Gdańsk.
Lviv’s participation in the fair highlights the partnership between the offices of Lviv and Gdańsk as UNESCO Cities of Literature and twin cities within the UNESCO Creative Cities Network. Lviv was designated a UNESCO City of Literature in 2015, and Gdańsk joined the network in 2025.
The stand “Lviv – UNESCO City of Literature” at the fair will be presented by a partner network of institutions. It includes representatives of the office of the same name, the Department of Culture of the Lviv City Council, the Hnat Khotkevych Palace of Culture and the Lviv Municipal Library.
The “Lviv – UNESCO City of Literature” office has been operating since 2015 on the basis of the Hnat Khotkevych Municipal Palace of Culture. A team of cultural managers is responsible for promoting and providing project support for the title at local, national and international levels, as well as for communication with and reporting to UNESCO.
As part of Lviv’s participation, a separate programme of literary events is planned.
On 11 September at 14:00 there will be a discussion entitled “Supporting literary practices at municipal level: significance, tools, prospects”. Participants will include Oleksii Taraban, Mariana Zahoruyko, Kateryna Alekseienko and the head of the “Gdańsk – UNESCO City of Literature” office, Elżbieta Foltyniak. The discussion will be moderated by Bohdana Brylynska.
On 12 September at 11:00 there will be a presentation of the project “Book of dreaming: how listening to children can help us change the world” with the participation of Mariana Zahoruyko and Magdalena Basak.
On 13 September at 11:30 there will be a presentation of the project “Voices of Defenders (the muses are not silent): when bare facts become literary testimony” with the participation of Ihor Dusan and Inna Korolenko. The event will be moderated by Agnieszka Lichnerowicz.
On the same day, 13 September, at 16:00 there will be a conversation with writer Olena Styazhkina on the topic “Each person’s story as a shared history. A consensus of memory”. The moderator will be Rafał Wnuk.