With Love - To All the Lonely Hearts
Nobody wants to be lonely right now. That’s why we brought you a series of intimate and unique letters: With Love – For All the Lonely Hearts. With contributions by Beri Shalmashi, Alfian Sa’at, Rodaan Al Galidi, Karin Karakaşlı and Marjolijn van Heemstra. Designed by Anja Groten and illustrated by Nawel Louerrad.
How do we deal with the persisting crisis? What can long lasting solidarity look like? Where do we find connection and joy in these pandemic times? Five writers from the Netherlands, the United States and Turkey search for answers and wrote you a letter.
From January onwards, subscribers received one letter each week.
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“And so, every night, at 3am, I talk to you. The people I haven’t met but know deep down, somehow. I try to picture your houses and your rooms. We are a tribe; a commune that rewrites the concept of family. I seem to have confidants in every corner of the world. It is a fresh prospect that reminds us of patience, to hope for the future.”
Letter 1: Karin Karakaşlı -
“There is no better way to escape reality than reading, there is also no better way to connect with it.Some books aren’t written to touch our souls, but for the writer to tell us something he knows. Those books I throw away to the recycling bin, even after reading just one page. I only read books that empower me and make me stronger, that touch my soul. Regrettably, I sometimes feel we are living in the past. The past that destroys us.”
Letter 2: Rodaan Al Galidi -
“He parks the car next to the tall grass, at the edge of the silhouette of the mountains. There he stands, an iPhone with a broken screen in his left hand, a Nokia with broken dreams in his right. Silver dots float through the twinkling air while a languorous voice speaks through the old device. Her husband has suspicions, she says. They have to end this.”
Letter 3: Beri Shalmashi -
“The genome is the blueprint of a cell and ninety percent of our human cells are filled with genomes of bacteria, fungi and other single cell species. Countless small, internal companions keep us upright. Our inner world is a teeming ecosystem, existing in many forms and far from lonely.”
Letter 4: Marjolijn van Heemstra -
“Humidity. Mosquitoes. Tropical traumas. Each morning, as part of a world slowly mending, I would hear birds quarrelling outside my window. One morning, I decided that they were actually beckoning. And so, for the first time in 20 years, I bought a pair of jogging shoes. I slapped on sunblock and marched to a nature trail 40 minutes from my house.”
Letter 5: Alfian Sa'at