Book fair feels winds of war

More than 400,000 titles will be exhibited

The world's biggest book event, the Frankfurt Book Fair, opens on Tuesday with the influence of the tense international situation keenly felt.

There is expected to be a prominence of works on international relations, military history and religion.

And books on Islam are likely to be in more demand than books about Greece, the fair's guest of honour for 2001.

Morrison has contributed to a compilation on the 11 September attacks

Organisers expect more than 400,000 titles to be displayed, from 6,700 exhibitors from 100 countries.

Only 40 exhibitors have pulled out because of a fear of travelling, organisers said.

One of the books being launched at the fair is called Tuesday, September 11, 2001.

Intellectual range

It is a compilation of writing by Paul Auster, Toni Morrison, John Updike and others about the attacks on the US - and the price of each copy sold will include a contribution to a victims' charity.

But spokesman Ruediger Wischenbart said that while Middle Eastern themes and terrorism would be major themes, the fair would still be intellectually wide-ranging.

A new study of Hitler claims he was homosexual

"The Frankfurt fair is never just about one subject.

"Of course we always deal with current events and this year the subject of Islam will be discussed, but so will globalisation, security, intercultural issues," said Mr Wischenbart.

Sexual orientation

World War II remains a very saleable theme, and one book which has already received a great deal of attention claims that Adolf Hitler had homosexual friendships in the 1920s.

Hitler's Secret - the Double Life of a Dictator by Lothar Machtan, modern history professor at Bremen University, argues that the Nazi dictator's later life can only be understood by taking into account his sexual orientation.

The fair will also highlight electronic media such as software, books-on-tape, CD-ROMs and videos.

But the breakthrough for e-books - handheld devices featuring electronic texts - may not come this year.

The effect of the internet crash and general economic nervousness may make consumers and publishers more sceptical about the new technology.