Literature Department

The Literature Department manages the core mission, organizational, and administrative aspects for the implementation of plans, programs, and projects associated with district cultural policies aimed at education, research, creation, circulation, and appropriation of literature, as part of the District Reading and Writing Plan of Bogotá.

The Department prioritizes the promotion of artistic practices: activities aimed at creators and cultural industries related to books (writers, editors and independent booksellers) and the appropriation of literature through activities aimed at the general public whose basic objective is the education of readers of literature.

The activities, thus grouped, address one or more of the dimensions of education, research, creation, circulation and appropriation.

The Literature Department groups its lines of action into five major programs: Circulation of Literature in the City, Writings of Bogotá, Training for the Appropriation of Literature, Promotion of Reading and Literature Incentives Portfolio and District Council of Literature.

Circulation of Literature in the City Book-based activities in which literature and authors circulate and make themselves known inside and outside the city, promoting the literary art among the general public and generating spaces of visibility for professionals in the sector.

This program features projects such as Bogotá Narrated (Bogotá Contada), the Bogotá International Book Fair, Reading Under the Trees and Literary Picnics, among others.

"I wondered what effect the mountain could have on the character of its people... The sea imposed its power by silencing you, forcing you to listen to its inexhaustible litany. The mountain, on the other hand, was the silence against which all sounds collided. It absorbed them, defeated without the need to boast."

Fragment of the text “The Sun is not Enough Happiness” (El sol no es felicidad suficiente) by Fernanda Trías (Uruguay), Bogotá Narrated 3..

Bogotá Narrated is a program of the Instituto Distrital de las Artes (Idartes) that summons the most prominent Spanish-speaking writers to come to Bogotá, tour it, get to know it, enjoy it, explore it, share it with their readers, and, at the end of the adventure, write a text about their impressions of the city. The result is published in anthologies of the Book to the Wind collection.

At the Bogotá International Book Fair, organized every year by the Colombian Book Chamber and Corferias and supported by the Bogotá Mayor’s Office, Idartes has its own program slot that is arranged by the Literature Department.

Through the Author’s Agenda, in alliance with other institutions and agents in the sector, the visit of national writers (who live outside the city) or international writers is managed so that they can circulate in different spaces such as libraries, bookstores, Training and Artistic Creation Centers (CREA, for the Spanish original), universities, market squares and cafés, among other spaces in the city.

Literary September features varied cultural offerings related to literature, books and reading. The agenda includes multiple events that feature poetry recitals, workshops, readings aloud, conferences and discussions on literary art.

Reading Under the Trees, our district literature festival, is a space in which book and reading lovers can share with family or friends a wide range of free access events outdoors, during two days, between artistic presentations, book barters, a poetry fountain, readings aloud, discussions, workshops, Book to the Wind presentations, book exhibitions, among other activities. Free admission activities for all audiences.

Our Literary Picnics are literary days where a “menu” of children’s books is offered and that infants, children and young people can enjoy in a series of activities around the oral and written word. In this recreational space for the family, readers will find the assistance of promoters who direct activities for various audiences, as well as plays, music, workshops and/or talks with illustrators and/or authors.

Writings of Bogotá is an educational program for citizens interested in acquiring or enhancing aesthetic and literary tools that allow them to explore creative writing and make a formal practice of it. This program includes different types of workshops:

• District Creative Writing Workshops: Spaces that open the possibility for citizens to participate free of charge in workshops of short stories, novels, chronicles, poetry and graphic narrative, led by widely recognized writers in the literary sector, aimed at advancing creative writing processes in each of these genres.
• Network of Local Writing Workshops: An articulated initiative that seeks to consolidate literary education offerings in the city and generate a solid process in which attendees approach literature with the help of expert trainers. Twenty workshops are held: nineteen in the city’s localities and one virtually. Its central objective is to generate spaces that enable the learning of aesthetic and narrative tools in the different localities of the city through creative writing workshops that allow its attendees not only to express themselves but also to recognize their community and local contexts.
• District Creative Writing Meetings (EDEC, for the Spanish original): Their objective is to promote and qualify literary creation in the city of Bogotá. The Meetings summon writers and friends of literature to a conversation that takes place with authors of recognized trajectory, who talk about their craft and fundamental issues in the creation of different literary genres. They are part of the strengthening actions that are being carried out for the creative writing workshops offered by the entity.

Training for the Appropriation of Literature: Learning of literary tools and the field of book circulation for an experiential practice of it. This program includes Book to the Wind and the processes of reading promotion.

Book to the Wind is a program to promote reading created in 2004 to provide free literature offerings to the citizens of Bogotá, based on the fundamental principle that reading should be a right of all and should be available to everyone. Book to the Wind has four collections to get closer to all readers: the Universal Collection is orange and groups together all texts of universal value, which have a place within the literary tradition without distinction of borders or eras. The Capital Collection, in purple, includes texts that have Bogotá and its surroundings as their theme. The Initial Collection, in lime green, is intended for children and early readers, and the Lateral Collection, in aquamarine blue, is a space open to non-traditional genres such as graphic novels, comic books, epistolaries and illustration, among other genres.

Reading Promotion with Book to the Wind: Sessions at the meeting points of Book to the Wind in which activities are carried out around books and reading for various audiences with copies of the collection.

The Department also offers its Literature Incentives Portfolio, a strategy to promote literary artistic practices through the District Incentives Portfolio and the Jury Bank that includes scholarships, residencies and awards in which the vast majority of actors in the book chain, such as translators, publishers, editors, writers, booksellers and others are supported. It offers four major national awards: The Elisa Mujica Narrative Award (exclusive for the participation of women creators), the City of Bogotá National Poetry Award, the City of Bogotá National Novel Award and the City of Bogotá National Short Story Book Award, as well as other district awards that include genres such as graphic novels and chronicles. The opening of the awards varies each year.

District Council of Literature: A space for citizen participation in which different agents of the literary sector participate as observers and support the formulation of cultural public policy in the literary sector. The Literature Department supports this space through the technical secretariat.