Attending an IBBY World Congress, whether for the first or for the eighth time, is always fascinating. First, there is the discovery of a new place—Trieste in the case of the 2024 Congress, a magnificent city located on the Adriatic Sea in north-eastern Italy bordering Slovenia and Croatia.
After the virtual IBBY World Congress in Moscow in 2020 and the 2022 World Congress in Putrajaya that I was unable to attend, I was very pleased to renew friendships with IBBY members from all over the world at the Trieste Congress this past August and especially to make new connections. The three days in Trieste were filled with wonderful activities (conferences, workshops, exhibitions, and roundtables) linked together by very interesting themes: actors of change, audience development strategy, poetry, and science. This rich content was accompanied by several illustration exhibitions, a concert, a welcome cocktail, and a gala celebrating the winners of the 2024 Hans Christian Andersen Awards (Canadian illustrator Sydney Smith and Austrian writer Heinz Janisch).
The enjoyment was even further extended for a number of us because, the day after the Congress, the IBBY Slovenia section had organized a visit into the Karst border region. I joined this trip along with Mayurika Chakravorty and Marcela Mangarelli, two members of the Scientific Committee for the 2026 IBBY World Congress that will take place in Ottawa. Also attending were IBBY members from many countries including Japan, Colombia, Korea, Australia, the United States, Russia, and India. Conversations started at the Congress continued in a more personal way in a beautiful environment.
We discovered a region where borders shifted due to historical events and towns and villages bore names in both Italian and Slovenian. The Duino Castle was named Devin under the Austro-Hungarian empire. Writer Anja Štefan read poems and nursery rhymes from her book Tunes from Mousedale Dunes. Our guides were Julija Potrč Šavli from IBBY Slovenia, Petra Potočnik from the Slovenian Reading Badge Society, and novelist Mateja Seliškar Kenda who read excerpts from her latest novel. Mateja told us that with the new border lines drawn up after the Second World War, local people had only a few hours to decide whether to leave everything to go to Italy or to stay put in Yugoslavia. Both options involved major uncertainties. Her novel became more vivid as we were going through landscapes described in her book and she was talking about the real experiences lived by family members. Visiting the Kostanjevica Monastery located in Nova Gorica in Slovenia, which was previously located in Gorizia, was a reminder of how history has a real impact on people’s lives.
The Karst region is a landscape of lush rolling hills and dense woods. As we arrived in the garden of Štanjel Castle, two storytellers told us a local tale with a devil-like character in Slovenian and in English; one told a feminist version, and the other had a more humorous tone.
This visit to neighbouring Slovenia closed in a very concrete manner: the discussions held at the IBBY World Congress about the topics of borders, overlapping languages, and shared experiences.
Thank you, IBBY Slovenia.
Submitted by Josiane Polidori, 2nd Vice-President, IBBY Canada and Co-Chair, Scientific Committee, 2026 IBBY World Congress
From Trieste to Slovenia: Crossing Borders
After the virtual IBBY World Congress in Moscow in 2020 and the 2022 World Congress in Putrajaya that I was unable to attend, I was very pleased to renew friendships with IBBY members from all over the world at the Trieste Congress this past August and especially to make new connections. The three days in Trieste were filled with wonderful activities (conferences, workshops, exhibitions, and roundtables) linked together by very interesting themes: actors of change, audience development strategy, poetry, and science. This rich content was accompanied by several illustration exhibitions, a concert, a welcome cocktail, and a gala celebrating the winners of the 2024 Hans Christian Andersen Awards (Canadian illustrator Sydney Smith and Austrian writer Heinz Janisch).
We discovered a region where borders shifted due to historical events and towns and villages bore names in both Italian and Slovenian. The Duino Castle was named Devin under the Austro-Hungarian empire. Writer Anja Štefan read poems and nursery rhymes from her book Tunes from Mousedale Dunes. Our guides were Julija Potrč Šavli from IBBY Slovenia, Petra Potočnik from the Slovenian Reading Badge Society, and novelist Mateja Seliškar Kenda who read excerpts from her latest novel. Mateja told us that with the new border lines drawn up after the Second World War, local people had only a few hours to decide whether to leave everything to go to Italy or to stay put in Yugoslavia. Both options involved major uncertainties. Her novel became more vivid as we were going through landscapes described in her book and she was talking about the real experiences lived by family members. Visiting the Kostanjevica Monastery located in Nova Gorica in Slovenia, which was previously located in Gorizia, was a reminder of how history has a real impact on people’s lives.
The Karst region is a landscape of lush rolling hills and dense woods. As we arrived in the garden of Štanjel Castle, two storytellers told us a local tale with a devil-like character in Slovenian and in English; one told a feminist version, and the other had a more humorous tone.
This visit to neighbouring Slovenia closed in a very concrete manner: the discussions held at the IBBY World Congress about the topics of borders, overlapping languages, and shared experiences.
Thank you, IBBY Slovenia.
Submitted by Josiane Polidori, 2nd Vice-President, IBBY Canada and Co-Chair, Scientific Committee, 2026 IBBY World Congress
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