One of the most interesting booths at the BEA (Book Expo America) convention held in NYC last week, was from Outofprintclothing.com. They were selling tote bags, note pads and "Shirts with a Mission." What nostalgia. And what…is the point?
"Sending books to Africa," a spokesman told me. The premise has been so successful that the company is now offering more modern book jackets and author photos, not just "public domain" material. I got a smile and a shake of the head and "No names," when I asked if any authors or book companies turned them down. I got the same when I asked about any specific authors who were particularly encouraging. "We don't want to single anyone out…but we've had a lot of wonderful responses."
Aside from book jackets and author photos, replicas of old fashioned library book pockets are also popular. Some folks remember fondly the days when a library book had a card in a pocket, with the date due stamped on it. So why not tote that image around?
The profits from the totes, notepads and shirts go to a worthy cause. Books. REAL BOOKS. It's nice to know that while bookstores are going under, and some thrift shops are overgrown with dollar books they have to toss in the trash, some people are glad to get books. This charity claims to have sent hundreds of thousands of books to a wide range of countries in Africa; basically any nation that asks.
Perhaps Mr. Poe is a favorite over there as well…after all, in his fable "Silence," he name-checks Zaire, which wasn't exactly a tourist destination in the 1840's. No, he never went there, but he fancied it quite a bizarre tourist attraction: "And overhead, with a rustling and loud noise, the gray clouds rush westwardly forever, until they roll, a cataract, over the fiery wall of the horizon..."
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