Dear The Readers,
The huge surge in interest last month has left us completely beside ourselves and with a million new things to do. Safe to say it has been exciting. Equally so is the fact that we have taken on two new Librarians; Mical and Siobhan who you can expect to see reading and giving strength to new creative ideas for this ever-growing project.
This month we are delving into the depths of winter with one of the most notorious Russian writers and one of my personal favorites- Dostoevsky –who’s life and work induces a strange beauty into the darkest depths of despair, and perhaps more broadly; the human struggle. To quote this month’s artist Andrew Finch “They say that art exists either to add poetic significance to the world or to show what otherwise cannot be seen and sometimes it does both. The life of the writer was filled with poverty and filth, he spent a greater portion of it attempting to survive on just drinking black tea.”
I met our January artist Andrew Finch at a house party almost 5 years ago. He pulled a book down from the shelf (of our unknown host) and wrote me an almost illegible description of the evening, gave me two book recommendations (Borges and Miller) and a pencil drawing of a mountain. I still have the book at my parent’s house. My favorite of his work ‘Memory Palace’ documents travel and comprises of beautifully organized collages of collected found things accompanied by handwritten prose, in the same illegible scrawl as is on my shelf.
"When you pay attention, you will see these little moments, not the profound ones, but the profoundly ordinary ones, that come when you pay your rent, that Dostoevsky articulated so well… when you can’t afford a good meal or get that little brown stain out of your jacket, and your eyes are open, that’s the old Russian inviting you for dinner, to share a little of his crust with you."
Don’t be deceived by the reputation of this writer as being difficult- once you’re in the flow you’ll have a lifelong friend...
Because of the growth of this young and quite experimental little project, we also would like to offer you the option to buy the postcards, or previous podcasts, separately on our website. As I hope you know, any and all profits will go to the artists, filmmakers, musicians and writers who are all contributing!
To sign up for January, and to keep this lovely thing moving and growing into a little slice of literary heaven in the abyss of the Instagram sludge purchase before December 28th to receive your copy of “Notes from the Underground” by Dostoevsky, along with exclusive artwork by Andrew Finch, and much more to your letterboxes during January. Get involved, get reading.
All our love,
Our little library, Sendb00ks.