Dick Ng, Filipe Melo, Philippe Graton, Clément Baloup, Clara Law, Eddie Fong, Lo Yi-Chin, Rodrigo de Matos, Wong Ka Long and Chen Li will be among the invited talent attending The Script Road – Macau Literary Festival’s grand opening this Saturday, 4 March, at the Old Court Building. Consuls-general of some of the countries represented by writers attending the Festival will join in the celebrations, as the Official Opening Ceremony and Inauguration of the Script Road Exhibitions commence at 3pm.

The much-anticipated 6th edition of The Script Road – Macau Literary Festival kicks off this Saturday afternoon with the renowned comic book authors Dick Ng, Filipe Melo, Philippe Graton and Clément Baloup, who will deliver a talk on “Illustrating Words – The Art of Comics” at 4pm. Lo Yi-Chin, a celebrated author from Taiwan, will then take the stage at 5:30 to discuss “The Labyrinth of Contemporary Chinese Fiction”.

President of the Macau Foundation Administrative Council, Mr Wu Zhiliang; President of the Cultural Affairs Bureau, Mr Leung Hio Ming; Director of the Macau Government Tourism Office, Ms Maria Helena de Senna Fernandes; Deputy Secretary-General of the Permanent Secretariat of Forum Macau – appointed by Portuguese-speaking Countries – Mr Vicente de Jesus Manuel; and President of the Macau Pen Club, Mr Li Guanding, will be in attendance at the Official Opening Ceremony and Inauguration of the Script Road Exhibitions, scheduled to begin at 3pm in the Old Court Building.

The Script Road is also pleased to include among its guests of honour the Deputy Director-General of the Department of Culture and Education of the Liaison Office of the Central People’s Government in the MSAR, Mr Zhao Chuan Dong; the Consul-General of Portugal in Macau and Hong Kong, Mr Vítor Sereno; the Consul for Culture and Public Relations of the Republic of Korea in Hong Kong, Mr Yu Byung-chae; the Consul-General of the United States of America in Hong Kong and Macau, Mr Kurt W. Tong; the Consul of Australia to Hong Kong and Macau, Mr Damien Dunn; and the Education Attaché of the Consulate-General of France in Hong Kong and Macau, Ms Servane Gandais.

The 2017 Festival’s debut afternoon will continue to unfold at the Old Court Building with Daniel de Roulet giving a talk on “Atomic Books – Hiroshima, Fukushima and Other Disasters” at 6:30pm followed by historical fiction novelists João Morgado and Raquel Ochoa at 7:30pm, elaborating on the topic “Stories with History”. The opening day culminates in a poetry session at The Script Road Café (Old Court Building) titled “The Poet’s Café”, featuring Chen Li, António MR Martins, Rai Mutsu, Wang Jiaxin and other, local poets.

For a more detailed look at the Festival’s Schedule visit: http://thescriptroad.org/schedule/

ABOUT THE MACAU LITERARY FESTIVAL

The 6th edition of the Macau Literary Festival will take place from 4–19 March 2017 and will be based at the Old Court Building — a former Government office erected in 1951 and located in the city centre — where a book fair will remain open throughout the event. A new anthology of short stories about Macau, published in three languages (Chinese, Portuguese and English), will be released during the Festival.

The Script Road – Macau Literary Festival was founded in 2012 by local newspaper Ponto Final — a periodical currently celebrating its 25th anniversary — and is based in the Macau Special Administrative Region (MSAR). The Festival began as the first and largest gathering of literati from China and the Portuguese-Speaking Countries ever organised in the world. In recent years, the Festival has gained in popularity, becoming an international event that welcomes renowned writers, publishers, translators, journalists, musicians, filmmakers and visual artists from various geographies and nationalities. The 2016 edition of the Macau Literary Festival brought together authors of 12 nationalities, including US writer Adam Johnson, who won the Pulitzer Prize for his 2012 novel The Orphan Master’s Son. In 2017, the Festival gathers more than 60 guests from over 20 regions and countries, among them two Man Booker Prize 2016 finalists.

The Macau Literary Festival has the support of the MSAR Government and Macau Foundation, as well as that of several private entities including the Festival’s Platinum Sponsor: SJM – Sociedade de Jogos de Macau. A number of private companies, local associations, schools and universities also support the literary event. The Diplomatic Missions of some of the countries represented by writers attending the Festival have also lent their support to The Script Road.