LOTW has now sold 1 million copies
in its various translations
VATICAN CITY, January 19 (Translated from ASCA) -
Light of the World, Benedict XVI's book-lenth interview with journalist peter Seewald, has now sold about a million copies in its various editions, according to the Vatican newspaper
L'Osservatore Romano, in its January 20 issue, which has a series of articles about the book, including an essay by editor Giovanni Maria Vian on the history of papal interviews since Leo XIII.
In the article on the book sales, the OR writes; "On the basis of the translations already published, total sales so far are around one million."
Referring to its sales in Italy alone, "the first 50,000 copies of the Italian edition quickly sold out, and a second edition - essentially to fill up reservations that had been made with bookstores - was issued a few days after the first printing."
The article notes that "this is not just an interesting marketing fact. It is also a sign of the desire for answers and stable reference points that people have in our time... A need that allows us to read in the number of zeroes found after the first-month sales - 100,000 in English, 80,000 in French, 200,000 in the original German - as in itself a sign of the times".
I would have posted a translation of the OR article itself on which the above was based, but OR has not posted it online. It has posted two longer articles - the essay by editor Giovanni Maria Vian about all known papal interviews given by the Popes since Leo XIII, and an interview with the head of the Vatican publishing house, who also discusses the forthcoming JESUS OF NAZARETH- Volume 2. I will post both as soon as I have translated.