It occurred to me this morning that I have never, as far as I can remember, asked you—the devoted readers of Letters of Note—about your favourite letters, which seems even more absurd as I type it out. Unforgivable, even. For fourteen years I’ve been harping on about the correspondence that grabs me, building up a hefty following of likeminded individuals along the way, and I’ve largely kept it one-sided, and in doing so I’ve probably, in fact definitely, missed out on countless opportunities to broaden my horizons. So I thought I’d try something a bit different with one of these open threads, which I’ve also never tried, and ask you very simply:
—Do you have a favourite letter?
Let me/all of us know in the comments below. Anyone can chip in. Paste a couple of lines or just point me to the right book or website or source and I’ll try my best to find it. It could be a letter I’ve previously shared, or, better still, a letter I’m yet to mention. It can be a letter from a published collection of correspondence or a biography, or even a letter you’ve sent/received yourself. It can be profound, silly, heartbreaking, long, short. It matters not. A letter is a letter is a letter, and I’m here for them all.
I’ll be keeping this discussion open indefinitely. It might become a permanent home for suggestions. And I’ll be replying to as many of you as humanly possible. I’ll work out a way to compile and share these letters in the near future, assuming I can get the necessary permission.
This is exciting. But it could also fall flat, in which case I’ll delete it and pretend it never happened.
I got your book, Letters of Note for my 98 yr old father to read to my 95 yr old mother. They have been voracious readers of good literature their entire lives so her going blind was a huge loss. Plus she's sliding into dementia. But let me tell you they loved that book. The length of the letters was perfect. They sometimes roared with laughter, my mom sometimes cried. Some made them very quiet and thoughtful. Sometimes my dad would say something like, "Well what do ya know about that?" I just know those letters percolated in their minds for quite some time. It was wonderful. I wanted to read it to but one of my siblings swiped it and so now I have to get my own copy. Oh well. Money well spent.
A letter from Zelda Fitzgerald to F. Scott Fitzgerald. This letter is on page 178 of Zelda by Nancy Milford and is to date my favorite love letter. I think its the line about the telephone that just feels so modern and relatable today even though she wrote this letter many years ago. Anyway here it is:
Goofy, my darling, hasn't it been a lovely day? I woke up this morning and the sun was lying like a birthday parcel on my table so I opened it up and so many happy things went fluttering up into the air: love to Doo-do and the remembered feel of our skins cool against each other in other mornings like a school-mistress. And you 'phoned and said I had written something that pleased you and so I don't believe I've ever been so heavy with happiness ... Darling— I love those velvet nights. I've never been able to decide whether the night was a bitter enemie or a grand patron—or whether I love you most in the eternal classic half-lights where it blends with day or in the full religious fan-fare of midnight or perhaps in the lux of noon— Anyway I love you most and you 'phoned me just because you 'phoned me tonight— I walked on those telephone wires for two hours after holding your love like a parasol to balance me. My dear—
I'm so glad you finished your story— Please let me read it Friday. And I will be very sad if we have to have two rooms. Please.
Dear. Are you sort of feeling aimless, surprised, and looking rather reproachful that no melo-drama comes to pass when your work is over—as if you [had] ridden very hard with a message to save your army and found the enemy had decided not to attack—the way you sometimes feel—or are you just a darling little boy with a holiday on his hands in the middle of the week—the way you sometimes are—or are you organizing and dynamic and mending things—the way you sometimes are—
I’m looking through a box of letters written by my (late) mother (known as Mort) to my father, Pvt. J.D. Doran, Squadon A MAAF Merced, California. The one I grabbed begins as follows,
“Tuesday (Feb. 8, 1945)
Hello I love you •
Just a line because I have to get up early tomorrow morning to go to the clinic...
Finished the embroidery on both the pink & blue squares (both floss not flannel) They both look cute as can be.
I’ll be on hand tomorrow night waiting for that call from you. It seems to make the week go faster knowing I’m going to hear your voice.
No more news -- but the surprising statement “I love you.” Bet you didn’t know that! (Excuse me -m- I forgot to include you. Stop kicking about it. I’ll correct that too)
We love you,
M & m “
This letter was sent from San Rafael a couple of weeks before my big sister Micki (m) was born. My dad was stationed at Merced Army Airfield, a training base.
It’s not a letter that’s of any great importance, just a love note from a young wife. It comes from a box labeled “precious letters” that may be precious to no one but M, who is gone now. Only memories remain...
I love Kurt Vonnegut's response to his book being burned (and pretty much every letter he ever wrote). Your site brings me immense joy and comfort and I have never reached out to thank you for your work. It has absolutely enriched my life.
My favourite letter is one of only seventeen syllables. A haiku. (The ultra-compact form of poetic expression that predates the tweet by hundreds of years.)
I received this haiku in reply to one that I sent in a birthday card to an old friend.
Apr 26, 2023·edited Apr 27, 2023Liked by Shaun Usher
At the age of 9, I watched the film A League of Their Own and was furious to find out that the high school I would eventually attend did not have a women's baseball team I could join. I wrote my first letter ever, to the Dean of the high school, to ask him the reason for this egregious error. He wrote me a letter back in which he spoke to me like an adult, respectfully and logically informing me that they couldn't have a women's baseball team because if they did, there wouldn't be any other teams to play against since no other schools nearby had women's baseball teams either. His letter changed my life as it showed me that I could DO something with letters - get information, solve problems, find answers, and maybe even change things. From that moment on, I was a letter enthusiast. I'm now 40 and still have the letter I received from him.
The letter from Vilma Grunwald, awaiting death in the concentration camp, imploring her husband to "take care of the golden boy". I cry every time I read it.
From James Joyce to Nora Barnacle. I enjoy uncommon love, as my own love and I are quite unconventional. While Joyce had his choice ways of expressing himself, his love letters to Nora always make me swoon.
“I love you deeply and truly, Nora. I feel worthy of you now. There is not a particle of my love that is not yours. In spite of these things which blacken my mind against you I think of you always at your best… Nora, I love you. I cannot live without you. I would like to give you everything that is mine, any knowledge I have (little as it is), any emotions I myself feel or have felt, any likes or dislikes I have, any hopes I have or remorse. I would like to go through life side by side with you, telling you more and more until we grew to be one being together until the hour should come for us to die. Even now the tears rush to my eyes and sobs choke my throat as I write this. Nora, we have only one short life in which to love. O my darling be only a little kinder to me, bear with me a little even if I am inconsiderate and unmanageable and believe me we will be happy together. Let me love you in my own way. Let me have your heart always close to mine to hear every throb of my life, every sorrow, every joy.“
When I was a child, I wrote to television personality Fred Rogers in braille. It is a reading/writing system created for blind persons. Mister Rogers very kindly wrote back to me using the same method of communication. I still treasure the two letters which he sent to me. After he passed away early in the 21st century, I typed his letters to me into a Word document for preservation purposes. I copy a brief excerpt from one of his letters to me below. Shaun: Can I email to you as an attachment the electronic version of Fred Rogers's letters? They are too lengthy to share here in full.
"Blake, even though you cannot see, there are many things you can do. Communicating about your thoughts and feelings is one thing you can do. And, it gives me a good feeling to know that enjoying our program is another thing you can do!"
The Kurt Vonnegut letter to the school kids. Perhaps not as deep as others, but significant in that it frees us from self-doubt and permits creativity which in turn puts us on a path to break boundaries (in a positive sense!).
Apr 26, 2023·edited Apr 26, 2023Liked by Shaun Usher
Oh Shaun, I have many favourites. As much as I don't want to reduce them to that box, I just love revisiting some on the days I need a little pick me up.
First and foremost has to be Helen Keller's letter to Nazi students burning her books. The loved bit has to be where she quotes: "History has taught you nothing if you think you can kill ideas. Tyrants have tried to do that often before, and the ideas have risen up in their might and destroyed them."
or Douglas Adam's feedback to not Americanise the world he weaved into the Galaxy or V.S. Naipaul echoing each writer has their own voice.
or your attempt to get our AI overlords suggest ways to end a letter. surprisingly they had roughly 500 ways to say it - some hilarious and some adorably sweet.
or the cry of a lone American in space in the aftermath of 9/11. or the letter from Vilma Grunwald. or Bill Baxley's letter to Dr. Fields. or Rilke. This is where I stop writing and recollecting 100s I have read because of you.
This curation of yours have led me to venture into the collection of letters of Van Gogh. Truth be told, its beautiful to read such letters with renewed intimacies, trust and beyond. Thank you, Shaun!
This one ! Not a week goes by that I don’t think of Stephen's reply …
I had no idea who to turn to. But I really needed someone to turn to and to ease the pain. So I wrote to Stephen Fry because he is my hero, and he has been through this himself. And lo and behold, he replied to my letter, and I will love him eternally for this.
Stephen’s perfect reply—written on this day in 2006
Leigh Hunt (1784 - 1859) was a friend and mentor to the poet John Keats. He wrote a letter to Keats's carer Joseph Severn on 8th March, 1821, unaware that Keats had already died some two weeks previously. The theme of the letter was also echoed in Leonard Cohen's last letter to his friend and muse Marianne (written 200 years later).
‘…tell that great poet and noble-hearted man that we shall all bear his memory in the most precious parts of our hearts, and that the world shall bow their heads to it as our loves do. Or if this…will trouble his spirit, tell him we shall never cease to remember and love him, and that Christian or Infidel, the most skeptical of us has faith enough in the high things that nature puts into our heads, to think that all who are of one accord in mind or heart are journeying to one and the same place and shall meet somehow or other again, face to face, mutually conscious, mutually delighted. Tell him he is only before us on the road, as he was in everything else; or whether you tell him the latter, or no, tell him the former, and add, that we shall never forget that he was so, and that we are coming after him.’
E.B White's letters of note were so humorous and self-effacing that I bought the book and have enjoyed all 685 pages. Stephen Fry's "It will be sunny one day" is in my wallet. Indeed there are many. I have bought 4 of your books. Many thanks, Shaun.
Sorry can't remember the great ones. But when a letter hits it out of the park, I send it to my closest friends and say, "You must sign up for these letters, see how great they are!"
Shaun, the point of this delightful addition to my inbox is that there is no algorithm attached to it, steering the subjects matter and narrowing the view. I like them all, some more than others of course, but I keep reading. I often don't have time to read long letters, but the brief and poignant, or funny, or angry, or historic etc.... are all fascinating. So happy I found you. or you me.
Nixon's resignation letter. Not just because it reminds me of the time when a crook could be shamed into doing the right thing, but because I've recommended it several times as a template for resignation letters and the like.
Virginia's letters are among my favourites. But the absolute best ones are: the one Vita writes to Virginia ("I am reduced to a thing that wants Virginia"), and another from a very very angry some Medici's wife ("You are driving me into such a state of despair that no hour of the day passes when I do not desire your death and wish that you were hanged. What aggravates me most of all is that we shall both go to the devil and then I shall have the torment of seeing you even there. I swear by what I loathe above all else—that is yourself—that I shall make a pact with the devil to enrage you and to escape your madness.") it always makes me laugh, it's so cathartic!!
Thank you Shaun for always being there, with beautiful letters, beautiful words....
THANK YOU for this service! As a high school English teacher, I I am so grateful for these contributions to humanity. My favorite letter is one of the most heartbreaking ones actually: Vilma Grunwald’s concentration camp letter to her husband and son. I have actually used it in my classroom when studying rhetoric…and I oftentimes forward moving and/or humorous letters by literary and/or historical figures to my students and colleagues to stamp their days with a little more culture. Again, thank you for this powerful endeavor! ~Abigail Beckwith
I love everything you post, and thank you so much for all you do. The letter I most remember is by Vilma on Holocaust Remembrance Day. Oh that just gutted me. So sad but beautiful.
Apr 26, 2023·edited Apr 27, 2023Liked by Shaun Usher
My favorite letter is a letter from my grandparents when my grandmother was dying of cancer. It is beautiful and thoughtful, and illustrative of the way they loved each other and me, and of just how hard and sad and beautiful that time was. There's a particular description of a moment when they found out her cancer was terminal and then in the same moment were surprised by a visit from their priest holding flowers that is especially moving and memorable. I have stacks of letters from them from my childhood - all creative and funny and wonderful - but that one is the one that stands out.
This letter from the Cleveland Browns lawyer is similar to the one from an irate railroad customer that you published recently. But it expresses what many of us feel when confronted with the petty: https://www.gq.com/story/cleveland-browns-letter-to-fan
May 4, 2023·edited May 4, 2023Liked by Shaun Usher
My son disappeared over seven years ago. One day while looking through his things, I found a letter he wrote to me several years ago. It was heartbreaking and comforting all at once.
On Your Birthday, March, 2010
Dear Mom
I always favored using blank cards — thought this one was nice and cheerful, much like you seem to be lately. I read a post you made on Tcom where you wrote a story about David. It definitely pulls you in. Your writing is beautiful. I wish I knew more about publishing. I’d just do it for you. Of course, I have the same problem with my music. It’s definitely hard to go all the way with a project. Even my first song isn’t really finished. Maybe we can inspire and help each other go all the way. Maybe we can even work together on some. We don’t want to end up like those posthumously famous authors. Anyway, I hope you have a great birthday — a well deserved celebration of how well you’ve been doing. I can see your words continue to inspire yourself and others as you travel down this path of transformation. I’ve always believed in you and admired your courage; felt lucky to have your love and wisdom. You may have felt frail and vulnerable in the past, but your love and passion for your children has never faltered, a resolute foundation of our lives. Today be proud, for I know I’m proud of you.
Love, Ben A.
In 2016, Benny and I began collaborating on a song I wrote. He was gone before we finished. During the few weeks he visited until the day he disappeared, we had a calm harbor together. After high school and college, he traveled all over the world and sent me letters and photos from everywhere he visited. But this letter, which came at a time when I truly needed it, will always be among my favorites.
I love John Steinbeck’s letter to his son about love - so poignant and powerful.
I wanted to share the email below. My father wrote it to his family and friends on receiving a diagnosis of terminal cancer, he died a few months later in October 2014.
My Dad, Peter Ferraz started the Splashy Fen Music Festival in South Africa. He had a boundless enthusiasm and optimism for life and handled his illness with such bravery.
Whew! Bolt from the blue here!
So, here I'm sitting up in a hospital bed, iPad at the ready and will try to make some sense of it all.
First of all a quick response to the messages of support received - you can have no idea, absolutely no idea, how much they have meant to me and especially to Almary,who has a far bigger emotional load to carry than I do. Almary has been able to acknowledge your messages in texts and emails but in many cases she has just not been able to talk directly. Either way we feel overwhelmingly wrapped in the love and support of many many unbelievable friends. You're so good! And don't forget also how much it has meant to our girls!
O.K. That's enough of the sadder stuff. There are actually a lot of positives - you knew I'd say that didn't you, but I actually really really mean it!
Some updated info, then, especially for those of you who might have been battling with communicating. We came down here to Maritzburg with a bundle of four cellphones, only two of which worked...antediluvian models whose pin nos had long since been forgotten, and ditto the iPad.
After experiencing several months of chest and abdominal pains, and many tests and scans that threw up in turn suspected Bornholms disease ( the Devill'grypp), large hiatus hernia ( real enough but only of minor importance now), a CT scan brought out the real culprit- cancer of the pancreas. So on Wednesday last week a lot of that was cut out and I was moved to intensive care. Unfortunately although the remaining pancreas was clear there had been some spreading to two lymph nodes. I don't know much about these things but my understanding is that the lymph is a bit like a rugby fly half. Once the ball gets to him he can distribute it to anywhere in the park. So bottom line scenario is maybe anything from two months to two years ( but I wouldn't even like to rule out 20!) of a relatively ok life.
You're wondering about the positives now, aren't you??!! Well there are lots, so I'll list them briefly:
1. Nobody can deny that I've had a bloody good life so far...above average. So I have no anger or bitterness about this timing, and know I'll cope with it . When I was a kid on occasional visits to Joburg we sometimes paid our tickets or sixpences at zoo lake and paddled out on little boats. Then half an hour or so later they would shout out "come in number 17 your time is up". That's always seemed to me some sort of explanation of how life works.
2. This is probably the best way to shuffle offstage, when you think about it. We all like to think it would be nice to go suddenly - lightning, heart attack etc - but it's also hell of inconvenient. We're never ready for it, and especially the tidying up of finances etc etc can mean hell for the rest of the family. Too much that could have been rounded off better.
( the other alternatives - slow undignified deterioration into rotten old age ; or spectacular chewing up by a great white shark while your loving family sits waving to you from the beach, are also not preferred alternatives)
3.emotionally. Saying goodbye. This is by far the best route. Your friends and family get to remember you the way you were in your prime. There are still a wonderful number of laughs and fun times to be shared, and a lot of time for everyone to get fully to grips with what's going on.
4. The Great Love Story. I have for a long time carried in my head a quote from C.S.Lewis, for maybe using in that great romantic novel I had up my sleeve to write one day. Lewis's wife got cancer and, distraught, he came out with an amazing statement: " the pain is part of the pleasure". For him this huge consuming love was brought into ultra sharp definition and poignancy by the awful pain he experienced. Does this make sense? To me it does
Just in the space of a few days I have learned the extraordinarily great value of the love and friendship of those about one. You're all in such sharp focus, such lovely lovely people. And after years of wanting to write the world's greatest love story I now find myself as a central character in it. And all of you are in it too. Oh my lovely lovely Almary. My lovely lovely family. And all of you lovely lovely friends. I think the pain/pleasure thing works in both directions also.
O.K. There'll be no more sloppiness.
What you can bet on, though, is that there will be lots and lots of good times still to come. And no problems with coping.
Apr 26, 2023·edited Apr 26, 2023Liked by Shaun Usher
Mr. Young –
With regards to the poem you sent me last July, I must question: How, in God’s good name, do you expect me to publish this trash?
There is not a single decent line in the entire thing. In fact, it is so filled with senseless monstrosity that I feel quite certain a 16-year-old could have written it. I nearly puked at the end of line 8, and by line 15 I stopped reading entirely.
Mr. Young, I have a second question to ask you – and I want you to think hard about this one: Why did you ever consider becoming a poet? With your unparalleled ability to spew nonsense, you could have easily secured a job as a radio show host, or better yet, a televangelist.
Mr. Young, before I close this letter, which I see now has been an utter waste of my time, I must tell you that in all my years as an editor, I have never seen such a pointless spouting of hideous decadence – and I daresay I never will again.
Take my advice, Mr. Young. Quit the writing profession.
There is letter from the book ''Julio Cortázar y Cris'' written by Uruguayan writer Cristina Peri Rossi, it's about the beauty of a relationship between both writers and how Cristina chooses to keep Julio Alive. Marvelous book. There is a letter there ''IX Carta de Chris a Julio, Barcelona 1983'', I have no record of the book being translated into English, but if anyone here knows or speaks Spanish have a read, it's an incredible way to get to know this two writers and have a look at what was like the life of these exiled literates back in the 70's an 80´s, fighting with their own demons, and the world's....much like us now, much like every other generation (at the end of the letter she says they should get together and do a list of every city's gender...''Tendríamos que hacer una lista con el sexo de las ciudades, nadie estaría de acuerdo, y eso es lo más estimulante. Además están las bisexuales, como Barcelona'')
Clyde S Shield’s Letter to a Grandson “it’s a strange and confusing world” inspired me to write a letter to my nephew when he was born. He’s just turned 9.
Henry James’ letter to Grace Norton ,” contains some of the greatest, most compassionate advice ever put to paper…”. I read it whenever I feel low and it always consoles me and lifts my spirits.
Hi Shaun - I don't have an immediate letter to suggest (but wracking my brain) ... but wondered how best to invite you to be a guest on my podcast, 2 Pages with MBS (briliant people read the best two pages from a favourite book). If you're interested, would you ping me at m@mbs.works? And if not, no worries ... thank you anyway for the treasure trove you share here.
I only last week came upon Letters of Note on Substack and I love it so much I have already gotten the book set. And THEN! To discover the READINGS of letters of note on Letters Live! What a pleasure!
Rilke, letters to a young poet. Somehow it feels like a secret even though I know he has a large, devoted following. I’m sure you’ve shared him before.
“No feeling is final”
“Learn to love the questions themselves…”
So many passages have been a life vest for me when I thought I might drown
A couple I have saved recently: Ethel Rosenberg to her sons; C.S. Lewis to a young girl…probably some others but don’t have access to iMac files. Keep up the good work.
I do not have a favourite letter from a real person, though I’ve written a few myself, but I do quite enjoy epistolary novels. If you’re open to suggestions, my favourite to date is called This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone
One of my fav books is "Speaking for Themselves: The Love Letters of Winston& Clementine Churchill," edited by Mary Soames. My copy dates back 25+ years and it is a wonderful testament to love and walk back through history. These days I think you'd have to look around for a copy as its been out of circulation for a while but it's a brilliant read!
I got your book, Letters of Note for my 98 yr old father to read to my 95 yr old mother. They have been voracious readers of good literature their entire lives so her going blind was a huge loss. Plus she's sliding into dementia. But let me tell you they loved that book. The length of the letters was perfect. They sometimes roared with laughter, my mom sometimes cried. Some made them very quiet and thoughtful. Sometimes my dad would say something like, "Well what do ya know about that?" I just know those letters percolated in their minds for quite some time. It was wonderful. I wanted to read it to but one of my siblings swiped it and so now I have to get my own copy. Oh well. Money well spent.
Just thank you for everything you do, it is genuinely life affirming.
A letter from Zelda Fitzgerald to F. Scott Fitzgerald. This letter is on page 178 of Zelda by Nancy Milford and is to date my favorite love letter. I think its the line about the telephone that just feels so modern and relatable today even though she wrote this letter many years ago. Anyway here it is:
Goofy, my darling, hasn't it been a lovely day? I woke up this morning and the sun was lying like a birthday parcel on my table so I opened it up and so many happy things went fluttering up into the air: love to Doo-do and the remembered feel of our skins cool against each other in other mornings like a school-mistress. And you 'phoned and said I had written something that pleased you and so I don't believe I've ever been so heavy with happiness ... Darling— I love those velvet nights. I've never been able to decide whether the night was a bitter enemie or a grand patron—or whether I love you most in the eternal classic half-lights where it blends with day or in the full religious fan-fare of midnight or perhaps in the lux of noon— Anyway I love you most and you 'phoned me just because you 'phoned me tonight— I walked on those telephone wires for two hours after holding your love like a parasol to balance me. My dear—
I'm so glad you finished your story— Please let me read it Friday. And I will be very sad if we have to have two rooms. Please.
Dear. Are you sort of feeling aimless, surprised, and looking rather reproachful that no melo-drama comes to pass when your work is over—as if you [had] ridden very hard with a message to save your army and found the enemy had decided not to attack—the way you sometimes feel—or are you just a darling little boy with a holiday on his hands in the middle of the week—the way you sometimes are—or are you organizing and dynamic and mending things—the way you sometimes are—
I love you—the way you always are.
Dear—
Good-night—
Dear— dear dear dear dear dear dear
Dear dear dear dear dear dear
Dear dear dear dear dear dear
Dear dear dear dear dear dear.
I’m looking through a box of letters written by my (late) mother (known as Mort) to my father, Pvt. J.D. Doran, Squadon A MAAF Merced, California. The one I grabbed begins as follows,
“Tuesday (Feb. 8, 1945)
Hello I love you •
Just a line because I have to get up early tomorrow morning to go to the clinic...
Finished the embroidery on both the pink & blue squares (both floss not flannel) They both look cute as can be.
I’ll be on hand tomorrow night waiting for that call from you. It seems to make the week go faster knowing I’m going to hear your voice.
No more news -- but the surprising statement “I love you.” Bet you didn’t know that! (Excuse me -m- I forgot to include you. Stop kicking about it. I’ll correct that too)
We love you,
M & m “
This letter was sent from San Rafael a couple of weeks before my big sister Micki (m) was born. My dad was stationed at Merced Army Airfield, a training base.
It’s not a letter that’s of any great importance, just a love note from a young wife. It comes from a box labeled “precious letters” that may be precious to no one but M, who is gone now. Only memories remain...
I love Kurt Vonnegut's response to his book being burned (and pretty much every letter he ever wrote). Your site brings me immense joy and comfort and I have never reached out to thank you for your work. It has absolutely enriched my life.
https://fs.blog/kurt-vonneguts-letter-book-burning/
My favourite letter is one of only seventeen syllables. A haiku. (The ultra-compact form of poetic expression that predates the tweet by hundreds of years.)
I received this haiku in reply to one that I sent in a birthday card to an old friend.
My birthday message was:
This, a small bundle
Of gift wrapped words left for
one who finds it so.
The reply:
So, is this your way
Of saying that you forgot
To buy me something?
At the age of 9, I watched the film A League of Their Own and was furious to find out that the high school I would eventually attend did not have a women's baseball team I could join. I wrote my first letter ever, to the Dean of the high school, to ask him the reason for this egregious error. He wrote me a letter back in which he spoke to me like an adult, respectfully and logically informing me that they couldn't have a women's baseball team because if they did, there wouldn't be any other teams to play against since no other schools nearby had women's baseball teams either. His letter changed my life as it showed me that I could DO something with letters - get information, solve problems, find answers, and maybe even change things. From that moment on, I was a letter enthusiast. I'm now 40 and still have the letter I received from him.
The letter from Vilma Grunwald, awaiting death in the concentration camp, imploring her husband to "take care of the golden boy". I cry every time I read it.
I like the letter "O". It's so all encompassing.
Henry James, "Sorrow passes and we remain."
From James Joyce to Nora Barnacle. I enjoy uncommon love, as my own love and I are quite unconventional. While Joyce had his choice ways of expressing himself, his love letters to Nora always make me swoon.
“I love you deeply and truly, Nora. I feel worthy of you now. There is not a particle of my love that is not yours. In spite of these things which blacken my mind against you I think of you always at your best… Nora, I love you. I cannot live without you. I would like to give you everything that is mine, any knowledge I have (little as it is), any emotions I myself feel or have felt, any likes or dislikes I have, any hopes I have or remorse. I would like to go through life side by side with you, telling you more and more until we grew to be one being together until the hour should come for us to die. Even now the tears rush to my eyes and sobs choke my throat as I write this. Nora, we have only one short life in which to love. O my darling be only a little kinder to me, bear with me a little even if I am inconsiderate and unmanageable and believe me we will be happy together. Let me love you in my own way. Let me have your heart always close to mine to hear every throb of my life, every sorrow, every joy.“
When I was a child, I wrote to television personality Fred Rogers in braille. It is a reading/writing system created for blind persons. Mister Rogers very kindly wrote back to me using the same method of communication. I still treasure the two letters which he sent to me. After he passed away early in the 21st century, I typed his letters to me into a Word document for preservation purposes. I copy a brief excerpt from one of his letters to me below. Shaun: Can I email to you as an attachment the electronic version of Fred Rogers's letters? They are too lengthy to share here in full.
"Blake, even though you cannot see, there are many things you can do. Communicating about your thoughts and feelings is one thing you can do. And, it gives me a good feeling to know that enjoying our program is another thing you can do!"
Oh Shaun, Let me tell you this, you are my favourite. So glad I found you. With a song in my heart, Perpetua
The Kurt Vonnegut letter to the school kids. Perhaps not as deep as others, but significant in that it frees us from self-doubt and permits creativity which in turn puts us on a path to break boundaries (in a positive sense!).
My favorite remains “To My Old Master.” Some make me laugh and others make me cry, but that one is simply brilliant.
The day after Reagan was shot, an 8 year old boy wrote him a letter to warn him:
Dear Mr. President, I hope you get well quick -- or you might have to make a speech in your pajamas.
P.S. If you have to make a speech in your pajamas, I warned you!
Reagan read it to Congress before giving a speech. Story from UPI is here:
https://www.upi.com/Archives/1981/04/29/Eight-year-old-Peter-Sweeney-slept-as-his-get-well-letter/7198357364800/
Oh Shaun, I have many favourites. As much as I don't want to reduce them to that box, I just love revisiting some on the days I need a little pick me up.
First and foremost has to be Helen Keller's letter to Nazi students burning her books. The loved bit has to be where she quotes: "History has taught you nothing if you think you can kill ideas. Tyrants have tried to do that often before, and the ideas have risen up in their might and destroyed them."
or Douglas Adam's feedback to not Americanise the world he weaved into the Galaxy or V.S. Naipaul echoing each writer has their own voice.
or your attempt to get our AI overlords suggest ways to end a letter. surprisingly they had roughly 500 ways to say it - some hilarious and some adorably sweet.
or the cry of a lone American in space in the aftermath of 9/11. or the letter from Vilma Grunwald. or Bill Baxley's letter to Dr. Fields. or Rilke. This is where I stop writing and recollecting 100s I have read because of you.
This curation of yours have led me to venture into the collection of letters of Van Gogh. Truth be told, its beautiful to read such letters with renewed intimacies, trust and beyond. Thank you, Shaun!
This one ! Not a week goes by that I don’t think of Stephen's reply …
I had no idea who to turn to. But I really needed someone to turn to and to ease the pain. So I wrote to Stephen Fry because he is my hero, and he has been through this himself. And lo and behold, he replied to my letter, and I will love him eternally for this.
Stephen’s perfect reply—written on this day in 2006
Ken kesey after his son was buried, so heartbreaking yet wonderful.
E B White winding the clock, printed and pinned to my locker door. Perfection.
Leigh Hunt (1784 - 1859) was a friend and mentor to the poet John Keats. He wrote a letter to Keats's carer Joseph Severn on 8th March, 1821, unaware that Keats had already died some two weeks previously. The theme of the letter was also echoed in Leonard Cohen's last letter to his friend and muse Marianne (written 200 years later).
‘…tell that great poet and noble-hearted man that we shall all bear his memory in the most precious parts of our hearts, and that the world shall bow their heads to it as our loves do. Or if this…will trouble his spirit, tell him we shall never cease to remember and love him, and that Christian or Infidel, the most skeptical of us has faith enough in the high things that nature puts into our heads, to think that all who are of one accord in mind or heart are journeying to one and the same place and shall meet somehow or other again, face to face, mutually conscious, mutually delighted. Tell him he is only before us on the road, as he was in everything else; or whether you tell him the latter, or no, tell him the former, and add, that we shall never forget that he was so, and that we are coming after him.’
E.B White's letters of note were so humorous and self-effacing that I bought the book and have enjoyed all 685 pages. Stephen Fry's "It will be sunny one day" is in my wallet. Indeed there are many. I have bought 4 of your books. Many thanks, Shaun.
Sorry can't remember the great ones. But when a letter hits it out of the park, I send it to my closest friends and say, "You must sign up for these letters, see how great they are!"
Shaun, the point of this delightful addition to my inbox is that there is no algorithm attached to it, steering the subjects matter and narrowing the view. I like them all, some more than others of course, but I keep reading. I often don't have time to read long letters, but the brief and poignant, or funny, or angry, or historic etc.... are all fascinating. So happy I found you. or you me.
This one! It always makes me laugh. https://news.lettersofnote.com/p/i-am-unable-to-accept-your-rejection
E.B. White’s secret reasons letter.
Nixon's resignation letter. Not just because it reminds me of the time when a crook could be shamed into doing the right thing, but because I've recommended it several times as a template for resignation letters and the like.
Virginia's letters are among my favourites. But the absolute best ones are: the one Vita writes to Virginia ("I am reduced to a thing that wants Virginia"), and another from a very very angry some Medici's wife ("You are driving me into such a state of despair that no hour of the day passes when I do not desire your death and wish that you were hanged. What aggravates me most of all is that we shall both go to the devil and then I shall have the torment of seeing you even there. I swear by what I loathe above all else—that is yourself—that I shall make a pact with the devil to enrage you and to escape your madness.") it always makes me laugh, it's so cathartic!!
Thank you Shaun for always being there, with beautiful letters, beautiful words....
Dear Shaun,
THANK YOU for this service! As a high school English teacher, I I am so grateful for these contributions to humanity. My favorite letter is one of the most heartbreaking ones actually: Vilma Grunwald’s concentration camp letter to her husband and son. I have actually used it in my classroom when studying rhetoric…and I oftentimes forward moving and/or humorous letters by literary and/or historical figures to my students and colleagues to stamp their days with a little more culture. Again, thank you for this powerful endeavor! ~Abigail Beckwith
Jackson, MO
I love Raymond Chandler’s letters. They’re witty, wise, and often drunk.
What a fun thread!
3) Gene Wilder’s notes on Willy Wonka Costume
2) EB White’s “Wind the Clock”
1) Luz Long to Jesse Owens 💔
I love everything you post, and thank you so much for all you do. The letter I most remember is by Vilma on Holocaust Remembrance Day. Oh that just gutted me. So sad but beautiful.
My favorite letter is a letter from my grandparents when my grandmother was dying of cancer. It is beautiful and thoughtful, and illustrative of the way they loved each other and me, and of just how hard and sad and beautiful that time was. There's a particular description of a moment when they found out her cancer was terminal and then in the same moment were surprised by a visit from their priest holding flowers that is especially moving and memorable. I have stacks of letters from them from my childhood - all creative and funny and wonderful - but that one is the one that stands out.
The first one that comes to my mind is one written by Vincent van Gogh in 1888.
"But what a compensation, what a compensation, when there’s a day with no wind. What intensity of colours, what pure air, what serene vibrancy."
(The entire letter is here: https://vangoghletters.org/vg/letters/let683/letter.html )
Thank you for this amazing project! <3
This letter from the Cleveland Browns lawyer is similar to the one from an irate railroad customer that you published recently. But it expresses what many of us feel when confronted with the petty: https://www.gq.com/story/cleveland-browns-letter-to-fan
My son disappeared over seven years ago. One day while looking through his things, I found a letter he wrote to me several years ago. It was heartbreaking and comforting all at once.
On Your Birthday, March, 2010
Dear Mom
I always favored using blank cards — thought this one was nice and cheerful, much like you seem to be lately. I read a post you made on Tcom where you wrote a story about David. It definitely pulls you in. Your writing is beautiful. I wish I knew more about publishing. I’d just do it for you. Of course, I have the same problem with my music. It’s definitely hard to go all the way with a project. Even my first song isn’t really finished. Maybe we can inspire and help each other go all the way. Maybe we can even work together on some. We don’t want to end up like those posthumously famous authors. Anyway, I hope you have a great birthday — a well deserved celebration of how well you’ve been doing. I can see your words continue to inspire yourself and others as you travel down this path of transformation. I’ve always believed in you and admired your courage; felt lucky to have your love and wisdom. You may have felt frail and vulnerable in the past, but your love and passion for your children has never faltered, a resolute foundation of our lives. Today be proud, for I know I’m proud of you.
Love, Ben A.
In 2016, Benny and I began collaborating on a song I wrote. He was gone before we finished. During the few weeks he visited until the day he disappeared, we had a calm harbor together. After high school and college, he traveled all over the world and sent me letters and photos from everywhere he visited. But this letter, which came at a time when I truly needed it, will always be among my favorites.
I love John Steinbeck’s letter to his son about love - so poignant and powerful.
I wanted to share the email below. My father wrote it to his family and friends on receiving a diagnosis of terminal cancer, he died a few months later in October 2014.
My Dad, Peter Ferraz started the Splashy Fen Music Festival in South Africa. He had a boundless enthusiasm and optimism for life and handled his illness with such bravery.
Whew! Bolt from the blue here!
So, here I'm sitting up in a hospital bed, iPad at the ready and will try to make some sense of it all.
First of all a quick response to the messages of support received - you can have no idea, absolutely no idea, how much they have meant to me and especially to Almary,who has a far bigger emotional load to carry than I do. Almary has been able to acknowledge your messages in texts and emails but in many cases she has just not been able to talk directly. Either way we feel overwhelmingly wrapped in the love and support of many many unbelievable friends. You're so good! And don't forget also how much it has meant to our girls!
O.K. That's enough of the sadder stuff. There are actually a lot of positives - you knew I'd say that didn't you, but I actually really really mean it!
Some updated info, then, especially for those of you who might have been battling with communicating. We came down here to Maritzburg with a bundle of four cellphones, only two of which worked...antediluvian models whose pin nos had long since been forgotten, and ditto the iPad.
After experiencing several months of chest and abdominal pains, and many tests and scans that threw up in turn suspected Bornholms disease ( the Devill'grypp), large hiatus hernia ( real enough but only of minor importance now), a CT scan brought out the real culprit- cancer of the pancreas. So on Wednesday last week a lot of that was cut out and I was moved to intensive care. Unfortunately although the remaining pancreas was clear there had been some spreading to two lymph nodes. I don't know much about these things but my understanding is that the lymph is a bit like a rugby fly half. Once the ball gets to him he can distribute it to anywhere in the park. So bottom line scenario is maybe anything from two months to two years ( but I wouldn't even like to rule out 20!) of a relatively ok life.
You're wondering about the positives now, aren't you??!! Well there are lots, so I'll list them briefly:
1. Nobody can deny that I've had a bloody good life so far...above average. So I have no anger or bitterness about this timing, and know I'll cope with it . When I was a kid on occasional visits to Joburg we sometimes paid our tickets or sixpences at zoo lake and paddled out on little boats. Then half an hour or so later they would shout out "come in number 17 your time is up". That's always seemed to me some sort of explanation of how life works.
2. This is probably the best way to shuffle offstage, when you think about it. We all like to think it would be nice to go suddenly - lightning, heart attack etc - but it's also hell of inconvenient. We're never ready for it, and especially the tidying up of finances etc etc can mean hell for the rest of the family. Too much that could have been rounded off better.
( the other alternatives - slow undignified deterioration into rotten old age ; or spectacular chewing up by a great white shark while your loving family sits waving to you from the beach, are also not preferred alternatives)
3.emotionally. Saying goodbye. This is by far the best route. Your friends and family get to remember you the way you were in your prime. There are still a wonderful number of laughs and fun times to be shared, and a lot of time for everyone to get fully to grips with what's going on.
4. The Great Love Story. I have for a long time carried in my head a quote from C.S.Lewis, for maybe using in that great romantic novel I had up my sleeve to write one day. Lewis's wife got cancer and, distraught, he came out with an amazing statement: " the pain is part of the pleasure". For him this huge consuming love was brought into ultra sharp definition and poignancy by the awful pain he experienced. Does this make sense? To me it does
Just in the space of a few days I have learned the extraordinarily great value of the love and friendship of those about one. You're all in such sharp focus, such lovely lovely people. And after years of wanting to write the world's greatest love story I now find myself as a central character in it. And all of you are in it too. Oh my lovely lovely Almary. My lovely lovely family. And all of you lovely lovely friends. I think the pain/pleasure thing works in both directions also.
O.K. There'll be no more sloppiness.
What you can bet on, though, is that there will be lots and lots of good times still to come. And no problems with coping.
Lots of love ,
Pete
X
"I must decline for secret reasons." ~ E.B. White
Mr. Young –
With regards to the poem you sent me last July, I must question: How, in God’s good name, do you expect me to publish this trash?
There is not a single decent line in the entire thing. In fact, it is so filled with senseless monstrosity that I feel quite certain a 16-year-old could have written it. I nearly puked at the end of line 8, and by line 15 I stopped reading entirely.
Mr. Young, I have a second question to ask you – and I want you to think hard about this one: Why did you ever consider becoming a poet? With your unparalleled ability to spew nonsense, you could have easily secured a job as a radio show host, or better yet, a televangelist.
Mr. Young, before I close this letter, which I see now has been an utter waste of my time, I must tell you that in all my years as an editor, I have never seen such a pointless spouting of hideous decadence – and I daresay I never will again.
Take my advice, Mr. Young. Quit the writing profession.
- Edwin Beattie, Editor in Chief, the _______
There is letter from the book ''Julio Cortázar y Cris'' written by Uruguayan writer Cristina Peri Rossi, it's about the beauty of a relationship between both writers and how Cristina chooses to keep Julio Alive. Marvelous book. There is a letter there ''IX Carta de Chris a Julio, Barcelona 1983'', I have no record of the book being translated into English, but if anyone here knows or speaks Spanish have a read, it's an incredible way to get to know this two writers and have a look at what was like the life of these exiled literates back in the 70's an 80´s, fighting with their own demons, and the world's....much like us now, much like every other generation (at the end of the letter she says they should get together and do a list of every city's gender...''Tendríamos que hacer una lista con el sexo de las ciudades, nadie estaría de acuerdo, y eso es lo más estimulante. Además están las bisexuales, como Barcelona'')
I've always been a big fan of the letters between poets Al Purdy and Charles Bukowski.
Clyde S Shield’s Letter to a Grandson “it’s a strange and confusing world” inspired me to write a letter to my nephew when he was born. He’s just turned 9.
Henry James’ letter to Grace Norton ,” contains some of the greatest, most compassionate advice ever put to paper…”. I read it whenever I feel low and it always consoles me and lifts my spirits.
Sorrow passes and we remain….
Hi Shaun - I don't have an immediate letter to suggest (but wracking my brain) ... but wondered how best to invite you to be a guest on my podcast, 2 Pages with MBS (briliant people read the best two pages from a favourite book). If you're interested, would you ping me at m@mbs.works? And if not, no worries ... thank you anyway for the treasure trove you share here.
I only last week came upon Letters of Note on Substack and I love it so much I have already gotten the book set. And THEN! To discover the READINGS of letters of note on Letters Live! What a pleasure!
Rilke, letters to a young poet. Somehow it feels like a secret even though I know he has a large, devoted following. I’m sure you’ve shared him before.
“No feeling is final”
“Learn to love the questions themselves…”
So many passages have been a life vest for me when I thought I might drown
A couple I have saved recently: Ethel Rosenberg to her sons; C.S. Lewis to a young girl…probably some others but don’t have access to iMac files. Keep up the good work.
I found the letters "To My Widow" by Robert Falcon Scott very moving.
Abigail Adams' "remember the ladies" is the most prescient letter in US history, IMHO.
I do not have a favourite letter from a real person, though I’ve written a few myself, but I do quite enjoy epistolary novels. If you’re open to suggestions, my favourite to date is called This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone
One of my fav books is "Speaking for Themselves: The Love Letters of Winston& Clementine Churchill," edited by Mary Soames. My copy dates back 25+ years and it is a wonderful testament to love and walk back through history. These days I think you'd have to look around for a copy as its been out of circulation for a while but it's a brilliant read!