Fabel
Fabel Silentbook library is located at Holmlia in Norway´s capitol Oslo. Holmlia is a hyperdiverse community with unique lingustic and cultural resources. Anita Berge is both the project leader of the library and the curator of the collection, that currently holds almost 300 silent book titles, in addition to a selection of pop-ups and multilingual books.
Mission
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Fabel is a vibrant place, bustling with both books and people: Newly arrived refugees, migrant and multilingual families, students, researchers, writers, illustrators and employees in Oslo schools and kindergartens.
Being unique to the Nordic countries, the work that is being done at Fabel has attracted a lot of attention. The creative approach to reading and mediating silent books has led to interesting collaborations with institutions like the Norwegian Institute for Children´s literature, OsloMet Universtity and NAFO (National center for multilingualism).
Fabel has been the center of several international reserach projects. One example is Spiral a collaboration between district of Søndre Nordstrand, OsloMet and University of Athens, where silent books were used for mediation with newly arrived refugees.
Another important collaborator is the local library, Deichman Holmlia. Through the project "Språkglede" ("Language Joy") we explore new approaches to inclusive mediation in multilingual settings, serving both families and local kindergartens.
The heart of Fabel, the very core of our practice, are all the families that come visit. Each year we have around 100 families that regurlary visit Fabel, from all corners of the world. At least 40 different languages are spoken at Fabel throught the year. The magic of silent books, especially in multilingual setting, is evident in the joy and enthusiasm they are met with by children and adults alike.
Book collection
Building a library of wordless books from scratch has been a fun, but challenging task. There are a few interesting collections of silent books around, but many of them are limited to translations in one language, for example a collection of all English, or all French titles. This approach does not give optimal diversity, due to the fact that a lot of beautiful silent books are never translated from their original language, and never hit the international market.
While building the library, Anita made three visits to the silent book library in Lampedusa, Italy, meticoulusly studying every single book in their collection. The collection in Lampedusa is donated from countries all over the world, and was an excellent starting point. The further refining and expanding the collection would not have been possible without the support and guidance of silent book enthusiasts from around the world. We are so very grateful for every single contribution, tip and advice!
This fall, Fabel was gifted a unique collection of 40 silentbooks from Korea by Kbby, Ibby´s organization in Korea. The books represent the very best of Korea´s silent books published between 2007 and 2024. Korean picture books are known for their exceptionally high quality, and these books are such a joy to read and study. The Korean books are already studied, read, performed and loved by both students, children, families and professors visiting Fabel, and we look forward to exploring them further.
A special room dedicated to the Korean collection is in the making, and we will provide a digital tour as soon as it is done!
Rooms
A lot of care has been taken in decorating the rooms at Fabel. We wanted to create a feeling of magic and fairy tales, and at the same time make every visitor feel at home. The rooms are built to compliment the silent books, but also to be suitable for both reading, play, studies, workshops and lectures.
It is always very interesting to see what books that catches different groups of visitors attention, and the main challenge with having first-time visitors is that they usually do not want to leave! At Fabel, we also offer a wide range of props, musical instruments, beautiful fabrics and everything else that can contribute to magical mediation of these wonderful books.
One of the most important goals for the silent book library is that we want it to be flexible, to be able to adapt to the changing need of the community that we serve. Several of the rooms have already been redecorated for this purpose, and we are constantly working on making Fabel the optimal space for all lovers of silent books, arts and languages.
Almost everything in the rooms are recycled: Furniture, carpets, curtains and decor. That way, we could both help save the planet and have more money left to buy silent books.
Want to see some glimpses from the workshops, visits, reading and lecturing that happens at Fabel? Please click through the gallery below!
Some glimpses from daily life at Fabel silentbook library!
