Most letters from a parent contain a parent’s own lost dreams disguised as good advice

Kurt Vonnegut writes to his daughter

Kurt Vonnegut during interview, 1981. (Photo: John McDonnell/TWP/Getty)

In 1947, Kurt Vonnegut became a father for the first time when his wife, Jane, gave birth to their son, Mark. Two years later, a daughter, Edith, arrived, followed by another girl, Nanette, in 1954. Four years later, tragedy struck when Vonnegut’s sister, Alice, and her husband, Jame…