Very untruly yours
How to sign off
For some time now, I’ve been assembling a long list of sign-offs deserving of a wider audience—a tangle of valediction too interesting to hog—and today is the day I begin unleashing them on you. Some are elegant (Gellhorn), some are sad (Battersby), some are painfully relatable (Kubrick), and some are just nuts (Dali, what on earth?). But literally all are preferable to the dull, lazily placed sign-offs the vast majority of us slap beneath letters and emails each day without a care in the world. Next time you send someone a message, please consider using one of these instead.
If you know of any other corkers, let me know by leaving a comment below. And if you haven’t already, please consider becoming a paid subscriber so I can spend even more time bossily telling you how not to close your correspondence.
Patronisingly yours, Shaun
Am Red beans and ricely yours, Louis Armstrong
Louis Armstrong
Letter to Betty Jane Holder
9th February 1952With my weak organs I am very fond of you. L.
Lydia Lopokova
Letter to John Keynes
1924Annoyed and depressed but lovingly, S.
Stanley Kubrick
Letter to Roger Caras
July 1965Yours till the ship sinks, Norman
Royal Navy gunner Norman Battersby
Letter to his family
Dunkirk, 1940Love Virginia (imperative) Love Virginia (absolute) Love? Virginia? (interrogative) Mine was the 1st. Virginia
Virginia Woolf
Letter to Vita Sackville-West
7th January 1928Love and red hot kisses from top to derrière, Noelie-poelie
Noël Coward
Letter to Alexander Woollcott
6th February 1936 Thank you, and I hope you choke. Very untruly yours.
An unhappy Beatles fan
Letter of complaint to Nike, Inc.
30th March 1987Yours in pleasure, John Steinbeck
John Steinbeck
Letter to Professor and Mrs. Eugène Vinaver
20th July 1957Tinkety tonk old fruit, & down with the Nazis always your loving Peter*
Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother
Letter to her niece, Elizabeth Elphinstone
7th February 1941
*As children, the Elphinstones had been unable to pronounce 'Elizabeth,' so naturally they called her 'Peter' instead. The name stuck.Always Your Stinking Old Friend Scott
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Letter to Ernest Hemingway
9th September 1929I tip my hat and make you a bow. With faithful feelings, Zora
Zora Neale Hurston
Letter to Helga Eason
14th February 1950Love, light and peace, Spike
Spike Milligan
Letter to George Harrison
6th December 1983Love, haste, Andy
E. B. White
Letter to Dorothy Hayes
10th December 1969Vacationally yours— Sylvia
Sylvia Plath
Letter to Constantine Sidamon-Eristoff
On holiday, 15th December 1951Farewell, Sir, a kiss on the palm tree from your Rotting Donkey
Salvador Dali
Letter to Federico García Lorca
1927Darling, a loving hand across several seas, Martha
Martha Gellhorn
Letter to William Walton
23rd November 1963Adieu, adieu, adieu! Mark Twain
Mark Twain
Letter to J. H. Todd
20th November 1905Ever thine. Ever mine. Ever ours.
Ludwig van Beethoven
Letter to his "Immortal beloved"
6th July 1812Hastily, but Sincerely, Langston
Langston Hughes
Letter to Richard Wright
29th February 1940With my love always and always and all-ways, Your Tib
Sylvia Townsend Warner
Letter to Valentine Ackland
23rd June 1947Yours in prickly heat, Papa
Ernest Hemingway
Letter to his son, Patrick
30th June 1939Ravaged love, Rich
Richard Burton
Letter to Elizabeth Taylor
31st March 1973Irritably yours, Dalton Trumbo
Dalton Trumbo
Letter of complaint to LA Telephone Signal Company
8th November 8th 1948



This makes me want to try harder with making my letters more interesting. And perhaps even my comment sign-offs?! Ta-ra, toodles, I'm off to eat noodles! Alice
Attorneyly Yours, this lawyer father to his 2 lawyer children.