France Reading Day

Since 1989, the French Ministry of Culture has organized annual events in favor of reading over a weekend. In 1989, Jack Lang, Minister of Culture, launched a vast operation to promote reading under the title La fureur de lire, which took place each year over a weekend in mid-October, the aim being to to broaden book audiences, highlight the players in the book chain and extend the literary season.

In 1994, Jacques Toubon, Minister of Culture, decided to extend the duration of the book festival, which became Le Temps des livres (15 days) in order to make the event accessible to school and university audiences and to give professionals the time necessary to carry out fund actions.

In 2010, Lire en Fête became Yours to read!, which now takes place over 4 days (from Thursday to Sunday) at the end of May.

Although the terms of the book and reading festival have been modified several times, the principle and the spirit remain the same. It is a question of appealing to the imagination of all professionals (authors, publishers, booksellers, librarians, institutional book trades, associative network, actors, storytellers, etc.) to widen the territory of the book and bring the widest public to the pleasure of reading.