Hungary

Special Reading Initiatives

A major literacy initiative in Hungary is Book Week, which is organized by the National Committee of the Hungarian Publishers and Circulators. Held annually in the first week of June, the primary goal of Book Week is to promote contemporary literature. Since its inception in 1927, this initiative has turned into a series of events nationwide.

Because people in Hungary spend less time reading now than in the past and in consideration of the results of the 2000 cycle of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), new literacy initiatives have been developed. These include a series of events called The Year of Reading held in 2001–2002, and an annual event called The Days of Children’s Literature that encourages reading.¹¹