There will be too little of everything.

Too few exhibitors, too few trade visitors, too few business deals and too few customers.

Like everywhere in the world, where supply and production chains are only now getting mixed up after almost two years of pandemic, as normal life is supposed to pick up again.

The book and other sectors of the economy groan like creaking joints when you get out of the rocking chair.

There are niggles everywhere, a lot takes longer, is more difficult, does not work, is absent.

And yet it was the right decision to resolutely restart the Frankfurt Book Fair this spring and to focus on a fair with exhibitors and an audience in autumn. Last year, the most important book show in the world with 3500 digital exhibitors took place in the virtual space, which was brave, as Ina Hartwig's head of culture in Frankfurt said on Monday evening at the presentation of the German Book Prize in the Kaisersaal des Römers, but also spooky. And for the Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels, which represents almost 4,000 publishers and booksellers from the Main metropolis and organizes the fair, a disaster. Many millions of euros in missing income and layoffs at his business subsidiary, the book fair company, were the result.

This year it starts again with financial support from the federal government and political backing from the state and the city. Römer, Wiesbaden and Berlin are happy to have set something in motion together, Messe Frankfurt is looking forward to a larger audience, the industry is looking forward to seeing you again and the region is looking forward to the spectacle.

Instead of 7,500 exhibitors, however, there are only 2,000. That was the last time there were decades ago.

Which shows that mere number fetishism has its deceptive side - the book fair was also important back then.

Nevertheless, everything is different than usual. The publishers from abroad, once dominant in the market, crowd around national stands seeking protection like partridges under the winter hedge.

And with the German-speaking publishers, it will look very clear with six-meter-wide corridors and a cap on the number of visitors to a maximum of 25,000 a day.

You can rely on the trade fair to grow over the next few years.

Many only stay away because of travel restrictions at home and because of health and financial caution.

That gives itself.

Too small?

Yes.

But exactly right.