launch of “LETTERS for dear AUGUSTINE” second edition by Alaric Sumner

Letters for dear Augustine was one of the works with which, apparently, Sumner was engaged at the time he died early in 2000.

Even while he was writing, he was – as he often did – thinking of the final published appearance.

At one point, Sumner had been considering publishing the text in his own hand-writing; but, within a year, he was also thinking of using the text for web-specific writing.

He began to treat pages of typescript as graphical images and enhanced them by the superimposition of constructions based on letters of the alphabet, a kind of illuminated text. This treatment dates from June 1999 and possibly continued into early 2000. It was not completed.

Sumner wrote “In part, Letters for dear Augustine are ‘readings through’ or ‘plunderings’ and distortions of other texts; and he listed many sources.

The book of LETTERS for dear AUGUSTINE was produced in the rush before the 2004 Alaric Sumner Festival. Textual errors were noticed almost immediately – they were glaring – and corrected with an errata sheet

This second edition by Writers Forum incorporates those typographical errors in the first edition . It does not include the illuminated pages: a special edition for that purpose will follow


Lawrence Upton © January 2007