Vol. 74/No. 23      June 14, 2010

Pathfinder Books from the United Kingdom participated in the event for the 18th time with sales similar to 2009, which had been a significant increase over previous years. The top seller this year was Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to Workers Power, by Jack Barnes, with 43 people picking up the title. In addition a Tehran distributor bought 17 copies to sell during the year.

While some fairgoers had heard of Malcolm X as a result of the Spike Lee Hollywood film, many, particularly younger people, did not know about the U.S. revolutionary leader but nevertheless wanted to buy the book after hearing a short explanation of its contents, browsing through it, and looking at the excellent photographs. The author’s explanation of the relevance of Malcolm’s revolutionary legacy to today’s working-class struggles was attractive to many. One was a young woman studying sciences in high school, accompanied by her mother. She said she wanted to read about politics and bought this book and two other titles on the struggle for women’s equality.

The second highest seller at the Pathfinder stand was Is Socialist Revolution in the U.S. Possible? by Mary-Alice Waters. Eighteen copies were sold, including one in French. A high school student who bought the book said, “I want something short to read in English that will broaden my mind.” Other high sellers were Is Biology Woman’s Destiny? by Evelyn Reed, the recently issued second edition of Lenin’s Final Fight, the pamphlet version of Malcolm X Talks to Young People, The Communist Manifesto, and Problems of Women’s Liberation, also by Reed.

According to Press TV—an Iranian satellite channel—more than 2,000 publishers, 1,100 Iranian and some 900 international from 80 countries, participated in the fair this year, exhibiting 200,000 books. The large Farsi section of the fair—housed in the ornate Shabestan building, part of a mosque that is under construction—was always crowded.

The same building housed a section for international publishers selling mostly academic textbooks and scientific and technical manuals where prices were subsidized by the government. Alongside this were stands from various countries including Azerbaijan, Egypt, France, Germany, Japan, South Korea, Russia, Turkey, and the Kurdish Regional Government in Iraq. There were also sections for children’s books and for publishers of Arabic titles from nearby countries.

Pathfinder, which sold 239 books and pamphlets this year, exhibited in the unsubsidized direct sales section of the fair for international publishers alongside local distributors for publishers such as Oxford University Press, John Wiley, Longman, and Macmillan.  
 
Legacy of 1979 revolution
The annual event is one legacy of the 1979 revolution by workers and farmers in Iran, who overthrew the Washington- and London-backed monarchy and opened the road to reading and culture for broad sections of the population. That brutal bourgeois regime had been brought to power in 1953 by a coup engineered by the U.S. government with support from the UK rulers, for whom Iran had been a semicolony for most of the previous half-century, with the country’s oil wealth siphoned off into British capitalist coffers.

Books on the fight for women’s liberation were among Pathfinder’s popular titles. A college lecturer bought five such titles, including Woman’s Evolution by Evelyn Reed, saying they were needed to present the historical case, outlined in Reed’s works, for the existence of matriarchy in early human societies. This person also bought The Communist Manifesto. Another academic needed books on Marxism and bought Introduction to the Logic of Marxism by George Novack, Problems of Everyday Life by Leon Trotsky, and Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to Workers Power.

One young man, who had bought Pathfinder books three years in a row at the fair, said, “I really like your books.” He picked up issue no. 7 of New International with the lead article “Opening Guns of World War III,” by Jack Barnes, about the 1990-91 imperialist assault on Iraq.  
 
Afghan, Kurdish readers
Visitors also came from among the Afghan and Kurdish population in Iran. A young Kurd bought Two Speeches by Malcolm X, The Long View of History, and Che Guevara Talks to Young People. A 19-year-old Afghan, born in Iran, bought Is Socialist Revolution in the U.S. Possible?, Genocide Against the Indians, and the pamphlet version of Malcolm X Talks to Young People.

Two Iranian publishing houses that between them have published around 30 copyrighted translations of Pathfinder titles are regular exhibitors at the fair. A large poster advertising the second and concluding volume of a translation of Woman’s Evolution was prominent at the stand of Golâzin publications. That book was for sale alongside several other translations of Pathfinder titles.

Also present was Talaye Porsoo, a publisher that reported it has sold some 400 copies this year of translations of Pathfinder titles, with The Communist Manifesto its top seller. Talaye Porsoo reported that its Farsi translation of Is Socialist Revolution in the U.S. Possible? will soon be coming off the press.
 
 
Related articles:
Workers protest for jobs in Iranian port city
Iranian filmmaker released from jail  
 
 
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