Israeli Bookstore Invites You to Crawl Into Bed With Don Quixote and Co.

This playfully memorable campaign for Israel's Steimatzky Books chain via ACW Grey in Tel Aviv does a fine job of communicating the intense, often transcendent relationship that can develop between readers and material on the printed page.

The series is headlined "The right book will always keep you company." Ads show folks fast asleep, the books they've been reading still in their hands, on night tables or nearby, with lifesize characters from the volumes sharing their beds.

The approach is in keeping with this advertiser's past oddball efforts, and it succeeds because the visuals, impressively realized with amazing attention to detail, compellingly illustrate and reinforce the campaign's theme. Of course, many people read as they drift off, but the bed imagery seems especially apt because books can help us think, wonder and dream in new, exciting ways. 

Some commenters find the notion of "sleeping" with Don Quixote, Sherlock Holmes, Gandalf and especially Joseph Stalin, the subject of Robert Service's acclaimed biography, unnerving or creepy. They might have a point, but nothing untoward is ever suggested here. Actually, avid readers often have "intimate," though presumably (and I'd add, thankfully) nonphysical relationships with books, and I suppose these ads do hint in that direction. Still, it's probably best not to read too much into it.

See more images from the campaign, and credits, after the jump. (Via Copyranter)

CREDITS:

Agency: ACW Grey Tel-Aviv, Israel

Executive Creative Director: Tal Riven

‎‏‪Client Manager: Elad Hermel‬

‎‏‪Creative Director: Idan Regev‬

Art Director: Daphne Orner

Copywriter: Kobi Cohen

‎‏‪Planning: Noa Dekel‬

‎‏‪Supervisor: Mor Pesso‬

‎‏‪Account Manager: Nataly Rabinovich‬

‎‏‪Producer: Racheli Zatlawi‬

‎‏‪Production Company: We Do Production‬

‎‏‪Photographer: ‬Shai Yehezkelli