Crown Princess Mette-Marit opened the Frankfurt Book Fair in Germany on Wednesday alongside her husband, Crown Prince Haakon.
The couple had been on a literature train with Norwegian authors travelling from Berlin to Cologne and on to Frankfurt where the world’s largest book fair was finally opened.
The Royal Court said that 2,000 were in attendance and an expected 300,000 are estimated to visit the book fair in the coming days.
Embed from Getty ImagesHer Royal Highness read “It’s That Dream” poem by Olav H. Hauge which has been described as Norway’s best poem; it also inspired the slogan for the book fair.
The Crown Prince Couple were joined by Prime Minister Erna Solberg of Norway who spoke at the event saying, in part, “When I read books, it’s not because I want to read about people like me. It’s to learn about others. And to learn about how others experience their meetings with my culture. There are many things I will never experience first-hand. Literature can make up for this.”
The book fair has a Norwegian pavilion which Crown Prince Haakon and Crown Princess Mette-Marit visited after the opening. It features books by hundreds of Norwegian authors with a record over 500 Norwegian books being translated into German this year for the fair.
The Frankfurt Book Fair goes back to 1478 and has a total of 4,000 events today. While Norwegian literature is the focus of 2019, it also has exhibitors from over 100 countries.
Crown Princess Mette-Marit is a passionate advocate for literature and became the ambassador for Norwegian literature abroad in 2017. In the past, she has hosted a literature train in Norway, but this year, she hosted a literature metro in Oslo to share her love of books with the Norwegian people.