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6 Best Bookish World Records

The Guinness World Records is sixty-two years old. To celebrate its birthday, here are the six coolest book- and reading-related world records.

Abby Hargreaves

Staff Writer

Abby Hargreaves is a New Hampshire native living and working as a Children’s Librarian in Washington, D.C. She fulfills the gamut of the librarian stereotype with a love of cats, coffee, and crocheting (and likes a good run of alliteration). Her MLIS degree enjoys the company of a BA in English from Hollins University, making Abby an advocate of women's universities. Her favorite color is yellow.

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The Guinness World Records book was first published sixty-two years ago as of August 27th, 2017. Every year since then, kids in libraries have relished in flipping through the pages between the shiny, holographic covers of the latest edition to find the most outlandish examples of humanity and beyond. Although the book changed its name since the 1998 iteration when the title was The Guinness Book of World Records, its popularity marches on. Read on for the six coolest book- and reading-related world records.

world's largest book

  1. Largest Book
    This Is the Prophet Mohamed came into being thanks to the Mshahed International Group in 2012. At 16.4’ x 26.4’, the book weighs more than one ton.
  2. Most Parents Reading to Their Children Simultaneously
    Reading to children is vital to their development. What better way to bring attention to early literacy than an event like this? To break the record in 2012, 2,479 parents in Shenyang, China gathered to read to their children.
  • Largest Collection of Miniature Books
    Confirmed on June 4, 2016, Indian collector Sathar Adhoor won the record for the largest collection of miniature books. At that time, he owned 3,137 individual titles in miniature. To commemorate another of the records he holds (Smallest Book of Stories and Poems), Adhoor took the excellent and proud photograph below with the smallest of his books.

    Sathar Adhoor with the certified Smallest Book of Stories and Poems

    Image courtesy of World Records India

  • Longest Audiobook
    If you’ve got plans for a lengthy road trip, this might be the record for you. A collection of lectures by Takaaki Yoshimoto titled 50 Lectures runs for 115 hours and 43 minutes. That’s one way to kill time!
  • Most Translated Author, Same Book
    Surprisingly, the most translated author for the same title is not J. K. Rowling with any of the Harry Potter books. Instead, L. Ron Hubbard holds that honor with The Way to Happiness as of 2010. Since its publication in 1981, it has appeared in sixty-nine languages. Hubbard was also featured in an earlier post this year in a list about cults and cult life.
  • Youngest Person to Write a Published Book (Male/Female)
    In 2005, five-year-old Adauto Kovalski da Silva published Aprender é Fácil in Brazil. However, Washington, D. C. native Dorothy Straight had him beat in 1958 when she published How the World Began in 1964.

    Happy birthday, Guinness World Records!