Xi'an paves the way

Focusing on the theme of the Silk Road, the expo set up a booth to showcase books from 34 countries involved in the Belt and Road Initiative.

An international forum on bookstores was also titled Silk Road, during which, a report was released that shows China, India, Germany, Spain and France are the top five countries that have the largest number of bookstores, among some countries that traded along the ancient Silk Road.

Former United Nations official, Michael Worbs, as well as Russian Bookvoed's founder, Denis Koto, and Turkish Kirmizi Kedi bookstore group's CEO, Murat Bahadir, attended the forum and shared their views on the running of physical bookstores in the face of the growing trend toward e-books.

Chinese author Jia also addressed translations of his books. In recent years, there has been a growth in the translation of Jia's body of work, which since the 1990s, has continued to grow with a new novel being released every two or three years.

Besides his frequent use of Shaanxi dialect in his novels, he says, "I'm afraid it's not easy to translate my texts, because of the cultural elements, and also the language style."

Canadian translator Dylan King is working on Jia's Qin Qiang (The Qinqiang Opera).