[Scpg] Book by Karl Linn--Building Commons and Community

[Wesley Roe and Santa Barbara Permaculture Network]

Come celebrate the publication of
Karl's book on creating commons

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In this beautiful hardcover book, lavishly illustrated with 379 
photos, Karl shares experience and practical wisdom to help people 
use the resources they find in their own surroundings to create 
welcoming shared spaces. As Karl observed, when people work together 
to build commons, they also grow community.


The book begins with a foreword by Joanna Macy and Karl's 
introduction, relating the thoughts and experiences that led him to 
the work of commons building. It goes on to cover the cluster of 
commons projects in the Westbrae neighborhood in North Berkeley, key 
examples of his neighborhood commons work on the East Coast during 
the 1960s through 1980s, a sampling of the temporary commons he 
coordinated at conferences and other special events, strategies for 
creating instant commons, and a how-to chapter on the foundations of 
commons building. The book closes with Carl Anthony's epilogue and an 
afterword by Karl's wife, Nicole Milner.


Thanks to a grant from the Ford Foundation's Sustainable Metropolitan 
Communities Initiative, which subsidized the cost of the color 
printing, this 224-page, 10 x 8.5 inch, full-color book is affordably 
priced at $29.95


Copies can be purchased at the event, ordered at
http://www.newvillagepress.net,
or purchased at the New Village office in north Oakland by 
appointment--(510) 420-1361
Copies won't be in bookstores until 2008.
You can support New Village Press by purchasing directly from them.

Please visit http://www.KarlLinn.org for a wealth of information 
about Karl's life and work, including a description of the book, 
table of contents, and sample text. We are in the process of creating 
a forum on the site where people can share stories and information 
about their projects related to creating commons.

Endorsements for the book:

"Karl Linn's compassion, humanity and insight into what makes good 
community design--and what, in fact, makes community itself--is 
exactly what much of the world  needs to develop if we are to evolve 
beyond our current frightful state of affairs.  He saw the need for 
space and safety, beauty and joy in people's lives--especially the 
lives of poor children--and he filled it by the truckload.  His was a 
quietly heroic life, lived close to the root of what really matters: 
an understanding that the happiness and peace we create for others 
is, delightfully, our own."
--Alice Walker, author, The Color Purple


"Seeing latent beauty and potentials in blighted urban spaces, Karl 
Linn took actions to realize his vision through gardening, farming 
and restoring environment.  Through the process, he inspired people, 
built communities, and transformed many public spaces.  He made us 
feel our heart."
- Lily Yeh, founder, Village of Arts and Humanities, Barefoot Artists


"We stand on the shoulders of Karl Linn, each of us who acts to 
creatively reclaim the commons for each and all communities. Karl 
Linn understood the greatest revolutionary secrets of all: not to 
fight but to create, not to be alone but to be together, and to 
recreate our common life beginning with the very ground under our feet!"
-- Mark Lakeman, founder, City Repair
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