Sirius Library Opening Ceremony Takes Place at the World Youth Festival

On March 3, a grand opening of the library, timed to coincide with the World Youth Festival, took place at Sirius University. Designed for 25,000 books, the storage facility was created in an open space, and the first literature from partner funds and from participants of the international event has already appeared here.

According to the authors' idea, books can be brought by any participant of the Festival - literature from different countries, Russian classics in English and other languages, scientific magazines, and encyclopedias.

To date, all installation work has been completed, the library space is fully prepared for reading, equipped with a reading room, a zone for receiving and issuing books. Participants of the Festival are already exploring the new place for reading, some of them have managed to bring their books, the fund has been replenished with Turkish, Spanish, Arabic literature. The story "Notes from Underground" by Russian classic Fyodor Dostoevsky in Turkish is also presented here, it was brought by the participants from Turkey the day before.

" The library will be a legacy of the World Youth Festival. Each participant chose which book to bring. It could be their favorite books from childhood or favorite characters with whom they feel connected. Today, people are giving a piece of their heart and soul. Thanks to this, Sirius University will create not only a library of knowledge - we will have a library of dreams of people from almost 190 countries, a unique library of human emotions of young people from all over the world," said Sergey Kirienko, Chair of the World Youth Festival Organizing Committee and First Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration, at the opening ceremony.

Vladimir Legoyda, Professor of the Department of World Literature and Culture at MGIMO University, said that he himself had also personally brought three author's books to the library, their artistic content varied from quatrains to extracts from life. 

I would like to congratulate Sirius University and the entire federal territory on this grand event, the creation of its own library. It will become not only a storage place, but also a full-fledged educational space, a real point of attraction for the best there is at Sirius. I am sure that not only students and staff of the Scientific and Technical University, but also residents of the federal territory will visit it, to read books here, hold meetings, listen to educational lectures, said Anton Gusev, Deputy head of the Talent and Success Foundation, Director of the Department of Science.

After that, he handed over the unique Atlas of Rare Plants of the Crimea and the Caucasus by Fyodor Biberstein (Friedrich von Biberstein) to the new library. This is a book that was finalized with the direct participation of students of the Sirius Educational Center from the programs of Science and Art. The students set themselves an ambitious task – to republish the atlas for the first time in 200 years, supplementing it with their illustrations and descriptions of plants. Under the guidance of leading experts, young talented artists and scientists have compiled the materials for republication, and 3 years later, in partnership with Nauka publishing house, the Atlas was published.

The open book storage has already become a landmark of Sirius, it has become very popular among participants of the World Youth Festival. In the future, the library will become a new place of attraction for residents and guests of the federal territory, a platform for learning, holding various educational lectures and educational events.

Lilia Kiryanova, Director of Sirius University, said, ‘Today we have opened a large-capacity storage for 24 thousand books, and this is only the first, a small part of the library that will be created at Sirius. Its total area will be more than seven thousand square meters. It will be located at Sirius University. It will also have branches: a music collection in the new concert complex which will be opened in December 2024, a sports collection at the sports facilities of the federal territory. In this way, it will be a global project that meets all the values and directions of Sirius development and is accessible to all its residents and guests’.

She added that on the first day of the library's opening, the Festival participants presented more than two thousand books to it, they brought their favorite publications. For example, Ruben Carvo from Venezuela brought to the library a book of children's stories, which he inherited from his grandmother.

“My grandmother read this book to me when I was a child, and she always said that she wanted to speak Russian. The book is in Spanish. Now I want to leave a piece of myself, my family and my country here at Sirius,” said Ruben Carvo.

Lilia Kiryanova, Director of Sirius University of Science and Technology, spoke about the first storage facility at the university in early February. At that time, specialists were working on bookshelves, the height of which exceeds ten meters. It is assumed that the library fund will be formed by university partners: publishing house Nauka, RIC Technosphere, Sberbank, publishing house Delo RANHiGS, Sovetsky Sport, Rosatom, Russian Railways, Nikitsky Botanical Garden - National Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences and others.

Lilia Kiryanova, Director of Sirius University, spoke about the university's first storage facility in early February. Then specialists worked on book racks, the height of which exceeds ten meters. It is assumed that the library fund will be formed by university partners: Nauka Publishing House, Advertising and Publishing Center Technosphere, Sberbank, Delo Publishing House at RANEPA, Soviet Sport, Rosatom, Russian Railways, Nikitsky Botanical Garden - National Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Medical and Biological Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences and others.

Sirius University was established in 2019 by order of Russian President Vladimir Putin. It currently runs master's and postgraduate programs, with specialist programs coming in 2024.

The World Youth Festival is taking place at the Sirius Federal Territory from March 1 to 7, 2024, as per the decree issued by Russian President Vladimir Putin aimed at fostering international youth cooperation.

The Federal Agency for Youth Affairs (Rosmolodezh) is the organizer of the World Youth Festival, with the Directorate of the World Youth Festival serving as the operator for WYF-2024.