Book distributionKrishna has given you great opportunity to preach the Krishna Caitanya cult in that remote part of the world. The time was there some years ago when Australia would not allow any coloured men to enter, but now you have allowed Caitanya Mahaprabhu to enter Australia and inundate the whole country with harinama sankirtana. Caitanya Mahaprabhu's another name is Pita Barana Gaura [Lord Caitanya, whose complexion is golden], so by your combined effort I hope that one day Pita Barana Gaura will rule over Australia. - Srila Prabhupada, from a letter to Madhudvisa Swami-----The arrival of Buddhimanta in Sydney had gone practically unnoticed. Amongst the tumult of Prabhupada's recent visit, however, Buddhimanta had started a quiet revolution. After a brief meeting with Srila Prabhupada, he had gone alone to Kings Cross that night, and in only two hours had sold $30 worth of Prabhupada's books -- a record! On the day of the initiations in the temple backyard, Buddhimanta had set up a small kitchen table covered with some cloth. On it he piled up hard-bound Krsna books, Srimad-Bhagavatam, and various other small, soft-covered volumes. Prabhupada had smiled as he noticed the table on his way to preside over the ceremony. Devotees were later amazed when they heard that Buddhimanta had sold 12 volumes of Srimad-Bhagavatam to guests that day.Although many devotees could not immediately see the far-reaching significance of these incidents, some, like Caru, saw them as the shape of things to come. Caru, and others in Australia, were already well aware that Prabhupada wanted his books distributed. The whole Krsna consciousness movement, Prabhupada had said, was built on books. Over forty years before, Prabhupada had received the order from his spiritual master: "If you ever get money, print books." The distribution of his books and magazines was the most important activity, for without books preaching would have no firm basis.Prabhupada had written to Upendra in Melbourne: The best news is that you are increasing nicely the distribution of my books and literature. This is the best activity, to distribute solid information about Krishna. Our preaching stands solid on these books. No other movement has such a vast background of authority.Devotees knew that Prabhupada's books had great spiritual potency. "Each time someone reads some solid information about Krsna," Prabhupada had said, "his life becomes changed. So I want that they be available to everyone, as much as possible."Prabhupada's far-reaching ambition was to replace mundane literature with transcendental publications. He wanted that in every home there be at least one piece of Krsna conscious literature. If a person read only one page, he reasoned, then his life could be turned to perfection. "If one per cent of the readers become devotees," he wrote, "that will change the suicide course of the world." His books and magazines, he said, were the most important weapons to defeat ignorance. Prabhupada had assured the devotees that removing such ignorance was the greatest service for all living entities.- From "The Great Transcendental Adventure" by HG Kurma Prabhu
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