The Buchmesse and Publishing Perspectives – welcome to the India Fan Club!

Frankfurt Book Fair’s renewed enthusiasm for India – epitomised by Vice President Claudia Kaiser’s January 2026 pledge to “bring Tamil literature to the world” – arrives after a relationship best described as episodic.

India served as Guest of Honour in 1986 and 2006, and the German Book Office opened in New Delhi in 2008, only to close quietly in 2021 after twelve years of minimal impact.

The fair’s own journal, Publishing Perspectives, has treated Indian publishing as an afterthought, covering New Delhi’s World Book Fair primarily when Sharjah-related press releases demanded it.

The Kolkata International Book Fair, inspired by the Frankfurt model and accredited in 1983 by then-director Peter Withers, hasn’t seen a Frankfurt representative on-site since 1997 – nearly three decades of absence.

Market Forces Trump Cultural Diplomacy

Kaiser’s current charm offensive – she’s been at speaking at both Chennai and the New Delhi World Book Fair – coincides with undeniable market mathematics.

India ranks as the world’s third-largest print book market, valued at US$8.8 billion in 2019-20 and projected to approach US$12 billion in 2026-27. With over 24,000 publishers and a youth demographic of 500 million aged 5-24, the country’s 19.4% compound annual growth rate outpaces most mature markets.

As Kaiser herself acknowledged in 2020, India offers “a lot of business to be done” despite piracy challenges.

Her recent Tamil Nadu appearance praised translation initiatives, noting that of 200 Indian authors translated into foreign languages through Chennai International Book Fair agreements, 90 hailed from Tamil Nadu – a statistic that explains her regional focus.

A Calculated Pivot

This isn’t cultural renaissance but commercial pragmatism. The Buchmesse’s 2024 visitor data showed 115,000 trade attendees matched by 115,000 public visitors, demonstrating Frankfurt’s own shift toward consumer-facing models it once dismissed.

India’s fifteen major literary events annually – from Jaipur to Kolkata – and the country’s wall-to-wall smaller literary events all year around, represent a network Frankfurt can no longer ignore.

The question isn’t whether Frankfurt’s interest is genuine, but whether Indian publishers will benefit from a partnership that has historically offered more symbolic gestures than substantive investment.

For now, the memo from Buchmesse HQ is clear: India is where the growth is.

The View From The Beach

TNPS has been saying that since we launched in 2017. The second and third posts of TNPS were both about India.

I said in the third post that India was global publishing’s brightest prospect, and eight years on stand by that.

The Buchmesse and Publishing Perspectives – welcome to the India Fan Club!

This post first appeared in the TNPS LinkedIn newsfeed.