Sixty-seven percent of respondents in a recent Capacent-Gallup survey stated they had bought books as gifts last Christmas, as reported in a statement from the Association of Icelandic Book Publishers.
Photo by Páll Stefánsson.
The association has in past decades surveyed the attitude of Icelanders towards the literature market. It turns out that in the years since 2000, around 60-70 percent of Icelanders have purchased books for Christmas presents, visir.is reports.
It was recently reported that more books than ever were published in Iceland this year; 842 titles, up from 405 in 1991 when Bókatíðindi, an overview of publications released before Christmas, was first published.
The increase is attributed to books being released in more forms than in hardcover, eBook, audio and paperback. After a slump following the banking collapse in 2008, the number of translated children’s book is increasing again.
However, the number of biographies is taking a dive. It appears that while the genre used to be the most popular in the pre-Christmas book season, publishers now focus more on other genres, such as crime novels.
Click here to read more about the record number of books published in Iceland this year.
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