Spring is in the air – a time for flowers, courtship and reading, encapsulated by the long-established Catalonian tradition of celebrating St George’s Day on 23 April with a celebratory festival that combines love, books and roses.

The Festival of Sant Jordi in Barcelona marks the victory over the eponymous crusading St George over the dragon, symbolised by our hero giving his rescued princess roses formed from the blood of the beast he has just slain. Patron saint of the region since 1436, booksellers in Barcelona took up the writer Vicente Clavel Andres’ idea of using St George’s Day as an opportunity to celebrate the anniversary of the death of Spain’s best-known author, Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (on 22/23 April in the Gregorian calendar) – known to the world as Cervantes – by merging a festival around gifting books (like Cervantes’ masterpiece, Don Quixote) with the religious commemoration and the legend of courtly love and floral displays of affection. The Festival of Sant Jordi was established in Barcelona in 1923.

Former Director-General of UNESCO (1987-99), Federico Mayor Zaragoza, wanted to bring his native city’s festival to the world. In 1995, he led UNESCO’s General Conference, held in Paris that year, to pay a world-wide tribute to books and authors on this date, encouraging everyone to access books: World Book and Copyright Day was established and quickly took root around the world.

On World Book and Copyright Day 2019, current Director-General of UNESCO, Audrey Azoulay, circulated her official message to mark the occasion. She referenced UNESCO’s International Year of Indigenous Languages (in 2019) and announced the start of Sharjah’s tenure as World Book Capital 2019.

The date 23 April was auspicious: it gives the world the opportunity to celebrate the lives of many writers of global significance, including:

Date of birth

• 1516 Georg Fabricius, German poet
• 1564 William Shakespeare, British playwright and poet
• 1708 Friedrich von Hagedorn, German poet
• 1818 James Anthony Froude, British chronicler and novelist
• 1852 Edwin Markham, US poet
• 1892 Minus van Looi, Belgian chronicler, novelist and short-story writer
• 1895 Ngaio Marsh, New Zealand crime-fiction novelist
• 1896 Margaret Kennedy, British novelist and playwright
• 1898 Edwin Erich Dwinger, German writer
• 1899 Vladimir Nabokov, Russian novelist
• 1902 Halldór Laxness, Icelandic novelist, playwright and poet
• 1918 Maurice Druon, French novelist and journalist
• 1923 James Kirkup, British novelist, travel writer and poet
• 1926 J P Donleavy, US novelist
• 1928 Okke Jager, Dutch theologian, writer and poet
• 1929 George Steiner, French literary critic
• 1937 Victoria Glendinning, British biographer, critic, broadcaster and novelist
• 1948 Pascal Quignard, French novelist, literary critic and screenwriter
• 1954 Michael Moore, US documentary filmmaker and author
• 1972 Pierre Labrie, Canadian poet
• 1977 John Oliver, British comedian, writer, producer, political commentator, actor and television host

Date of death

• 303 St George, Greek officer in the Roman army, beheaded: patron saint of many countries and causes
• 1616 William Shakespeare, British playwright and poet
• 1616 Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, Peruvian chronicler and writer
• 1616 Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Spanish novelist, playwright and poet
• 1695 Henry Vaughan, British poet
• 1740 Thomas Tickell, British poet
• 1850 William Wordsworth, British poet
• 1889 Jules-Amédée Barbey d’Aurevilly, French novelist and literary critic
• 1915 Rupert Brooke, British poet
• 1926 Joseph Pennell, US illustrator, printmaker and art critic
• 1929 Rudolf William Nilsen, Norwegian poet
• 1936 Teresa de la Parra, Venezuelan novelist
• 1945 Albrecht Haushofer, German geographer, diplomat and author
• 1952 Minus van Looi, Belgian chronicler, novelist and short-story writer
• 1975 Rolf Dieter Brinkmann, German poet, novelist, essayist, chronicler and short-story writer
• 1981 Josep Pla, Spanish [Catalonian] novelist and journalist
• 1993 Bertus Aafjes, Dutch poet
• 1996 Pamela Lyndon [P L] Travers, Australian children’s author
• 2007 David Halberstam, US chronicler and journalist
• 2011 John Sullivan, British comedy writer

Other celebrations on the day

• The Nobel Prize for Literature was announced each year on 23 April in the years 1901-2017. From 2018 onwards, in the light of organisational restructuring, announcements for the Nobel Laureates are now made in the autumn of 2019: press release, 5 March 2019 | article, ‘Nomination and selection of Literature laureates‘)
• In the UK, World Book Night is a national celebration of reading and books managed by The Reading Agency that promotes events for giving out books to people who are not regular readers