World Book Day – UK

World Book Day – UK

World Book Day is celebrated on an entirely different day in Britain from the rest of the world. World Book Day is a charity event held annually in the United Kingdom and Ireland on the first Thursday in March. The rest of the world will be celebrating this event on 23 April but we folks in the UK have claimed this day for our celebrations. Even my work joined in; holding a book fair for the employees.

Initially launched in 1998, a £1.00 special World Book Day Book Token was given to several million schoolchildren, this token could be redeemed against any book in any UK bookshop.  The event  has grown each year to include new initiatives like Spread The Word, Quick Reads Initiative and Books for Hospitals – the amount of schoolchildren receiving a token has also increased. In 2000, four separate £1.00 books were published to celebrate World Book Day. A new set of special £1.00 books have been published every year since.

This initiative was not around when I was in Primary School which really was a shame. I do remember a book fair came round once and everyone was strongly encouraged (or forced to be honest!) to purchase at least one book. The books were priced at a discounted rate so it wasn’t too bad really! I was about eight at the time but I can still remember what I bought (and I still have the books!):

I remember picking up The Hobbit because I loved the Ralph Bakshi version of The Lord of the Rings! I bought The Snow Spider Trilogy because I really liked the BBC version of The Snow Spider. Even then TV/Movies were shaping my reading habits!

**Just as an aside – this was my 200th blog post!!**

Here is a link to find out more about: World Book Day

Related Posts

Subscribe to Blog via Email