Solange and her personal studio and platform, Saint Heron, has officially launched the Saint Heron Community Library, a free library of rare and esteemed books by Black creators. According to Variety, readers are able to borrow a book for 45 days beginning Monday, October 18th.
In partnership with Aesop, the first season of the Saint Heron Community Library will run from October 18th until the end of November. The debut season of the library includes 50 titles of valuable and rare literature and was curated by Rosa Duffy, the founder of “For Keeps Books,” a bookstore in Atlanta.
In a conversation between Rosa Duffy and Shantel Pass, Duffy said that for the Saint Heron Library collection, “it was really focusing on the people that we know and love, but we might not know the details of what they do. So highlighting these artists, I think that’s really important, because then you get to the different mediums and the different spaces that we can move throughout that we might not always be affirmed that we can move through.”
This season’s collection includes an incredible array of works by both well-known and unfamiliar writers and creators. Some of the titles include Earthquakes and Sun Rise Missions: Poetry and Essays of Black Renewal by Haki R Mahubuti, The Black Unicorn by Audre Lorde, Poems from Prison by Etheridge Knight, and My One Good Nerve by Ruby Dee.
According to Solange herself, “The Saint Heron Library continues the work we have been building by preserving collections of creators with the urgency they deserve.” The library is a network, a community that amplifies, centers, and gives the deserved respect and recognition to the genius and ingenuity of Black creators and artists. It is exciting to see which curators Solange and Saint Heron will bring in next, and especially, to be exposed to more Black creators, writers, and artists. To borrow from and explore the specially curated library, go to the Saint Heron website.
For Bookstr’s own content centering on Black authors and voices, click here.