A Yom Kippur service will be held at the Frankfurt Book Fair in West Germany, beginning with Kol Nidre prayers on the eve of Yom Kippur, Friday , October 5, and continuing throughout Saturday, October 6.
This decision was taken, with the cooperation of book fair officials, but largely through the initiative of American book publishers and the JWB Jewish Book Council, in cooperation with the JWB Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy, after many American publishers and editors expressed outrage when they learned that the Frankfurt Book Fair coincided with Yom Kippur. The fair, the world’s largest, will take place October 3-8.
Fair officials apologized for what they maintained was an oversight, but said they could not reschedule the fair this year. Ronald Weber, of the fair’s press and information department, sent a letter to Publishers Weekly late last year expressing regret at the scheduling. He said that fair officials, to avoid a repetition of this year’s fiasco, had checked the dates of Yom Kippur through 1990 “and have settled with the fair management the dates on which the Frankfurt Book Fair is not to take place.”
The JWB is shipping to Frankfurt more than 400 copies of the High Holy Day prayer book it published for American Jewish military personnel. Zebra Books, a New York publisher of mass-market books, said it was inviting 500 fair participants to a ” Break-the-Fast” party at the Hotel Intercontinental beginning after sundown October 6.
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