The Virtual Typewriter
When my wife and I opened Literati Bookstore in Ann Arbor, Michigan, I set out a typewriter for anyone to use. Eight years and countless typewriters later, thousands of people have left anonymous notes at our store, which I took great pleasure in reading every night. In March 2020, that stream of notes dried up when our store had to close for the pandemic. I was bereft.
No more notes of love or loss. No new marriage proposals. No notes about hope, no long letters to passed away beloved cats. No more pen pal relationships between werewolves and 7-year-olds. No more fart jokes. What once was a symbol of community had suddenly become a transmission vector.
I lamented this to Oliver Uberti, co-editor of our book Notes from a Public Typewriter. He called up his brother Justin, a software engineer, and a few weeks later, voila!—they had created a virtual typewriter complete with clicks, clacks, and a carriage return!
Our actual typewriter began clacking again when the bookstore reopened in May 2021, yet this site continues to receive thousands of anonymous notes from around the globe. They’re a remarkable time capsule of our shifting hopes and fears. We’d love if you left a note behind.
Yours in bookselling,
—Michael Gustafson