‘In the capital of thought’: The 13th Book Arsenal Festival opens in Kyiv

Despite a week of brutal Russian attacks involving over 1,000 drones and missiles, the 13th Book Arsenal Festival opened in Kyiv. The event brought together Ukraine’s literary and artistic community, along with international guests and readers. Among the attendees were political figures, including Volodymyr and Olena Zelensky.

The book fair features 100 large and 11 small publishing houses, 6 bookstores, and partner stands of military and volunteer initiatives. The Illustrators’ Fair includes 12 participants, and the festival will also host 16 exhibition projects. This year’s festival includes over 200 events. According to the organizers, Book Arsenal is working to revive some of its most successful formats from previous years — including the Illustrators’ Fair and the small publishers’ zone.

This year’s focal theme of the Book Arsenal is “Everything is Translation”, curated by Marci Shore and Oksana Forostyna.

It is a great honor for me to be here in Kyiv today. This is my fourth visit since the start of the full-scale invasion. Each time, I feel immense gratitude to be able to return. It’s been a privilege — not only because the team I’ve worked with are such outstanding professionals, but also because I feel a magnetic pull toward Kyiv. And not despite the war, but because of what is happening here. Kyiv today seems to be not only the capital of the free world in a time of rising tyranny — it is also the capital of thought. A place where thinking becomes crystallized and intense. I am grateful to be part of it

said Marci Shore.

For the first time, the focal theme is co-curated by two people separated by an ocean.

We worked from different continents, in different time zones — but Marci was able to truly feel what we are breathing here. It’s a miracle how precisely she captured the theme that was already in the air

noted writer, translator, and co-curator Oksana Forostyna.

The curator of the festival’s main program, “Our Arsenal,” is Iryna Slavinska.

This year, as curator of the main program, I wanted to talk about books and reading as a way to cope, as a way to feel a little freer, a little more ourselves. It goes without saying that Russian occupiers are attacking Ukrainian books: bombing libraries, burning and confiscating publications. But books help us remain ourselves. Books help us hold the line. A book is a gesture of freedom, a gesture of liberation

Slavinska said.

2025 Book Arsenal Fellows: publishers, agents and rights managers from Georgia, Estonia, Italy, Poland, Czechia, Finland, France, and Sweden

The Book Arsenal is more than just an event. Everyone here at the Arsenal today, everyone who contributed to the creation of this 13th International Festival — we are living proof that the enemy will fail. On a large scale — definitely. No matter how hard they try, we have our festival and we will keep holding it as long as we have the strength,

said the festival director, Yuliya Kozlovets, during the opening ceremony.

As reported earlier, in 2024, the Book Arsenal welcomed 35,000 visitors.

Photo: Yevhenii Zavgorodnii, Roman Shalamov, Serhii Khandusenko, Andrii Tsykota, Anna Putylina.