This year’s long-awaited Lifeline Canberra February Bookfair, held at EPIC, will be truly epic: not merely the biggest in three years, since before the pandemic began, but the biggest ever.
“We are finally free of the shackles … of COVID,” Lifeline Canberra CEO Carrie-Ann Leeson said.
“We have been holding onto some special books and pallets of books for February knowing that now, without the restrictions and the limitations, a lot of the anxiety around attendance isn’t there. So, rather than put all these books out, and not necessarily have the public feeling brave enough to come, we’ve now got them all coming out.”
Lifeline will transport and unpack 200 pallets this year; Ms Leeson calculates that books alone, if laid next to each other, would lap Lake Burley Griffin, bridge to bridge, three times.
That does not count CDs, DVDs, puzzles, or games (all carefully assembled by Lifeline volunteers to ensure no pieces are missing).
Altogether, Ms Leeson says, there will be hundreds of thousands of items for sale.
Funding the crisis support line
The three bookfairs held each year – two at EPIC and one in Tuggeranong – are Lifeline Canberra’s biggest fundraisers. All the money raised is directed towards their crisis support and suicide prevention service. A life-saving call to the support line (13 11 14), available 24/7, costs $26 – as much as a handful of books.
“The service exists for absolutely any one of us, any time of day or night, any conceivable human crisis,” Ms Leeson said: particularly mental illness, thoughts of suicide, or domestic violence.
“Having a physical presence [at the Bookfair] is a win-win, because it builds a relationship within the community,” Ms Leeson said.
Visitors to the Bookfair meet Lifeline staff and volunteers: “Not necessarily those on the phones, but the individuals committed to the community. It puts a face to a name and removes some of the barriers to that [visitor] reaching out for help when they need it.”
Rare books and children’s activities
The Lifeline Bookfair runs at EPIC’s Coorong and Budawang buildings from Friday 10 to Sunday 12 February.
On Friday, serious book shoppers and dealers from as far as Brisbane and Perth descend, looking for collectors’ items and rare books. The full list will be published online before the event, “so people can suss out what they’d like to potentially grab first when they get here,” Ms Leeson said.
The treasures next month include The Woodblock Paintings of Cressida Campbell (2010, $800); J. M. F.’s Panorama de Constantinople (circa 1910, $500); Lawrie Baymarrwana and Bentley James’s Yan-nhanu Atlas and Illustrated Dictionary of the Crocodile Islands (2014, $500); the Sketchbooks of the American painter Richard Diebenkorn (2015, $200); and Sasha Grishin’s Australian Art: A History (2013, $150).
It’s not all serious or highbrow, though. There will be children’s activities, too, on the Saturday: facepainting, games, gelati, and additional toys. This is the first time Family Day (supported by Icon Water) has been held “in its full glory” since the pandemic started.
“That’s always been something that the families gravitate towards,” Ms Leeson said.
Donations
The Bookfair isn’t just a place to buy books; it’s a place to get rid of unwanted ones, too. Many Canberrans drop off their old books at the front, empty their bags, and then refill them on the way through the fair, Ms Leeson said.
“It’s a beautiful cycle, and we get so many donations.”
To make it easier for book donors, this year there will be a drive-through service at the Fitzroy Building, so visitors do not have to carry their books to Lifeline.
But these donations will not surface in the upcoming Bookfair: they go back to the Mitchell warehouse, which, like the crisis support hotline, runs 365 days a year. There, volunteers sort them and palletise them for the next event, or sell them at Book Lovers Lane, Lifeline Canberra’s bookshop at the Fyshwick Fresh Food Markets. Donations can also be made at Mitchell or the bookshop.
“We never know what we’re going to get, or when we’re going to get it,” Ms Leeson said. “Sometimes individuals will be downsizing or moving; sometimes individuals are heading overseas, and they’re parting with much loved books and treasures that they wouldn’t otherwise part with. But because these books go to Lifeline, because they receive a new life and a new home, and because they then fund such a vital service for the community, we find ourselves receiving very high value, scarce, rare books.”
A new normal
Lifeline received a million calls in 2022, and Ms Leeson anticipates the same number again this year.
Canberrans, she said, have struggled in varying capacities through the pandemic, and are trying to support one another.
“We’re trying to get everything back to a sense of normalcy – but it is a new normal. It’s wonderful to see the Canberra community bringing events back and supporting events full steam. That’s going to allow us to recover and heal.
“But we are also seeing and noticing a large degree of burnout, high degrees of anxiety in individuals who haven’t necessarily struggled with anxiety before.”
Some who have worked from home are anxious about returning to the office; others at how the world is reopening, and travel returning.
“For every one of us, it’s unique. Are we free of all of the effects of COVID? Absolutely not. People are carrying a load still. There is work to be done. For all of us, that means something different, but that’s why Lifeline and organisations like Lifeline exist: to help people in a safe space gather their thinking, enable coping, and decide next steps, and then get referrals on to services.”
This year, Lifeline Canberra will increase the number of education courses it runs, from mental health wellbeing and resilience to training first responders.
“In addition to what we’re doing on the postvention and intervention fronts, we’ve invested heavily in prevention to give people the skills they need early on to help themselves and to help others,” Ms Leeson said.
She thanked the public for supporting Lifeline’s service during the pandemic.
“We’re grateful to the Canberra community who have supported this event in every way, shape, or form over the last three years – whether it’s at the bookstore, whether it was making donations in the absence of a Bookfair that was cancelled, whether it was attending during COVID, wearing a mask, standing in line, and having to exercise patience …
“We’re just so pleased to be back and offering the Bookfair in all its glory again.”
Lifeline Canberra Bookfair at Exhibition Park in Canberra (EPIC), 10-12 February: Friday 9am-6pm, Saturday 9am-5pm, and Sunday 9am-4pm; lifelinecanberra.org.au
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