Literary VIPs visit Australia

IFACCA/Artshub,
04 March 2002, Australia

The Australia Council is this week hosting nine publishers and literary agents from Europe, the UK and USA, as part of its Visiting International Publishers (VIP) program. In this, VIP's fifth year, visitors Elido Fazi (Fazi Editore, Italy), Migual Aguilar (Tusquets Editore, Spain), Christoph Buchenwald and Eva CosseƩ (CosseƩ Publishers, Netherlands), Sarah Lutyens (Lutyens and Rubenstein, UK), Anee-Louise Fisher (Scout, UK), Ravi Mirchandani (Heinemann, UK), Liv Bulmer (Karpfinger Agency, USA) and Andre Bernard (Harcourt, USA) will attend Adelaide Writers' Week and meet with local authors and publishers. Australia Council CEO, Jennifer Bott, commented that rights sales valued at more than $1.5 million dermonstrated VIP's success to date. It is estimated that at least 50 titles have gained overseas publications due to the program, which will have hosted 50 visiting professionals come mid-March 2002. While attending Writers' Week activities, a number of this year's guests will also speak at a special panel session, 'Finding Books Finding Markets', on 7 March.