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xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxSusan Mildred Brown
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxAll About
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxThe Great Lost Art
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxof Letter Writing
D -liver D-letter D-sooner D-better. That's what we used to scrawl along the sides of our envelopes back when I
was in high school. I still feel the same way. A letter is a mini-present, a treat that's becoming more and more rare.
Long-distance services proliferate. Modems fill the air with intra computer blather. But the 37-cent stamp with
potential for miracles is most often stuck on checks, consumer complaints and proxy votes.
Take heart. This dark age of letter writing is your chance to shine. In fact, there is no easier, cheaper or more
effective way to establish yourself as a person of taste, wit, charm and class than to make letter writing your
signature. Letters can grant immortality. At my local bookstore, the letters of Jean Rhys, Igor Stravinsky, Delmore
Schwartz, William Faulkner, George Bernard Shaw, Ezra Pound, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Jane Austen,
Randall Jarrell and many others sell briskly.
Who would know, today, just how ravishing a lover Napoleon Bonaparte must have been, had he not written thus
to Josephine:
I wake filled with thoughts of you. Your portrait and the intoxicating evening which we spent yesterday have
left my senses in turmoil. Sweet, incomparable Josephine, what a strange effect you have on my heart! But is
there still more in store for me when, yielding to the profound feelings which overwhelm me, I draw from
your lips, from your heart, a love which consumes me with fire? Ah! It was last night that I fully realized
what a false image of you your portrait gives!
It was a letter that made Tom Wolfe such a beacon of the sixties. Wolfe had gone to California, on assignment for
Esquire magazine, to do a story on the custom-car world. On his return, he couldn't pull the story together. Esquire
was holding a two-page color picture spread for him—and he had no story to back it up. The editor told Wolfe to
go home and type up his notes as a memorandum. Maybe someone else would be able to analyze the material and
write it in time. The resulting memorandum was actually a long letter to the editor, which began "Dear Byron."
Wolfe wrote the letter all night, while listening to rock and roll, his understanding of his subject growing as he wrote.
Come morning, he rushed the letter to the editor, who struck off the salutation and ran it in the magazine. It was
called `The Kandy-Kolored Tangarine-Flake Baby"and it was the first piece of what became known as "new
journalism."
You needn't be a Tom Wolfe, a writer or a philosopher to write a thrilling missive. A letter can nourish a friendship,
settle a score, set the record straight, encapsulate an era, declare undying affection and save a fortune in phone bills.
You probably can remember (and may have saved) cards and letters that moved, fascinated, delighted, shocked,
horrified or saddened you. The psychological ramifications of both sending and receiving letters are numerous and
varied.
Letters can be a form of self-analysis, according to Dr. E. Scott Nininger, current president of the Westchester
Psychoanalytic Society in New York. He cites the letters of Sigmund Freud, which helped the daring young theorist
to delve into his own “id, ego and superego”, and which give modern psychiatrists such a warm, intimate view of
their scientific forebear. Nininger says that people read between the lines of personal letters—scanning the salutation
(My dear Mr. Jones, Dear Mr. Jones, Mr. Jones!) and otherwise measuring the degree of politeness and cordiality
to learn the true feelings and intent of the writer.
Okay. Letters are fun, valuable, and can even make you famous. But who has time to write one? That excuse won't
do. Suzanne O'Malley, the busy screenwriter, writes letters to save time. When she needs to reach someone, she
finds that by the time she has called repeatedly and found the person out to lunch, or on a business trip, she could
have simply written a letter to convey her message. Even a hopelessly informal but easy to dispatch email can often
wind up in a recipient's Junk Mail folder, or accidentally be deleted. Despite all our technology, a letter can still be
the fastest way to communicate.
If you're sold on letter writing but still feel intimidated when you sit down and face that blank page of stationery, here
are some suggestions that may instill self-confidence:
• Launch your letter with a blast. Start with an interesting sentence, not with an apology for not writing sooner.
mExamples: Well, here's one for the Guinness Book of World Records...There's a rumor that...One week ago
myesterday I sailed...What wonderful, welcome, joyous news ...Believe it or not...At this very moment...You'll
mnever guess who came last night.
• Think of what you would say if the reader were in your presence. What would interest him/her?
• Bring your letter in for a perfect three-point landing. Don't ever end with a wishy-washy statement. Use a strong
mclosing like: You're constantly in my thoughts...Stay tuned for the next episode in the life of (signature)...I'll see
myou in two weeks, when we can hug in person...I'm eager to hear how you succeed with your new project...Sorry
mmy news wasn't more cheering...I miss your sage counsel.
• Avoid standard closings. Try something like these: In friendship...On tenter-hooks...Fraternally (or In
msisterhood)...Warmly...Your crazy friend...Despondently...Optimistically.
If you make a list in advance of what you want to say, use the active voice, and carefully check your spelling and
punctuation, you're sure to produce letters that are worthwhile and welcome.
A word of caution from Bonnie Erbe,a veteran reporter and host of the PBS TV show, “To the Contrary”: "When
you put something in writing, it becomes a higher level of proof than if it's oral. A piece of writing can be submitted
as evidence at a trial, even a small-claims trial. Judges and juries are more likely to believe something that they see
written down than testimony about what allegedly was said."
Time to begin? Quoth Pliny the Younger: "You say there is nothing to write about. Then write to me that there is
nothing to write about."
© Susan Mildred Brown is a freelance writer.
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