A quality Estonian book is a bearer of Estonian language and culture. On the one hand, masterpieces of national culture help to interpret and mediate the past and on the other hand they constitute a cultural message from the early 21st century.

Publishing in Estonia is mainly run by the private sector. Publishing houses are small and abundant: there are more than 700 publishing houses listed in the commercial register (for many of them publishing is, however, just a sideline and they have published only one or two books). The number of active publishing houses amounts to 30-40.

The circulation of Estonian publications is low: in the case of a novel, the print run is usually 800-1000, while it is 300-600 for a collection of poems. Only some bestsellers have larger runs. In comparison with the Soviet era, the print runs have decreased in some cases by tens of times, but the number of publications coming out every year has more than doubled in comparison with 1990. This means that a larger amount of different books are being published now and that the reader thus has a wider choice.

Publishing as a private business is subject to general Estonian legislation regulating activity in the field of business and economy. In addition, publishing is regulated by several legal acts which directly concern it, for instance the Compulsory Copies Act, Copyright Act (in 1994 Estonia joined the Bern Convention), Value Added Tax Act (5% VAT has been applied to books since 1999), Act to Regulate Dissemination of Works which Contain Pornography or Promote Violence or Cruelty, and several other Estonian legal acts that indirectly influence publishing.

As the Estonian book market is so small, a lot of works important for Estonian national culture require publishing support. Literature and publishing receives budgetary support from the Ministry of Culture, but they are also supported by the special sub-endowment of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia. Both the Ministry of Culture and the Cultural Endowment also support competitions in different literary genres (eg. drama and novels) and give awards to the best books (for example the annual literature awards Fr. Tuglas novel award, Betti Alver debut award and Juhan Liiv poetry award).

Translating Estonian literature into foreign languages is also supported by the Cultural Endowment’s programme Traducta. In order to better introduce Estonian literature into the international arena, the Estonian Literature Information Centre was established in 2001.

2000-2001 was Estonian Book Year, commemorating 475 years since the publication of the first Estonian book. This event was also organised with the support of the Ministry of Culture. 2003 was named Kreutzwald’s Year and commemorated 200 years since the birth of the writer of the Estonian epos. On both occasions many events were arranged abroad as well as in Estonia.

Total amount of titles

1990	2002	2003
1628	3458	3732

Total edition size

1990 (millions)	2002 (millions)	2003 (millions)
17.4	5.4	5.6