I recently evacuated a storage bin of books and papers and came across a few boxes of letters that pertained to my publishing; letters from editors, to editors (carbon paper, anyone?), marketing folks, publicity, from teachers and librarians, friends.
For those not familiar with letters, I speak not of computer fonts, but exchanges, written on paper. Sometimes, gasp! written by hand.
These days, I use e‑mail every day, all the time. It is instant communication, it is usually brief, to the point. It moves things along fast.
Old letters—communications—were often slow to arrive, often over-written, took time to read, and to absorb.
They were usually typed (remember typewriters?) and in their way, short essays. There were some really good letter-writers, and it was considered a form of literature. You may find published collections of letters. For some research I’m doing, on my desk, right now, is a collection of letters from Francesco Petrarch (1304–1374) one of the founders of renaissance humanism. There are collections of letters by Lincoln, John Steinbeck, Virginia Wolff, and so on.
And they were (are) interesting. I doubt if anyone will publish The Collected E‑Mails of, well, anyone.
But what my own mailbag of publishing past (as I suspect, would be the case for other writers) reveals, is a different world, a world of personality, characters, and thoughts, composed thought. “What would you think about…?” “I’ve been considering…” “I’ve mulled over your ideas for a while and….” “I have to admit I don’t find …..”
It all comes across as much more of an interchange between people working towards an understanding, of creation. And the personalities of editors, market folk, editorial assistants come across, people who have thoughts and ideas that they need to share, are there to read. With time for personal asides: “Yesterday I saw our old mutual friend….” “I’ve been reading….” “By chance, last week I …..”
Because I’ve been in publishing for a while, I’m often asked what’s the difference between what is, and what was. By looking at these old letters I find that the work of creating a book was much more about shared creativity (and life) more than the mere making of a book. No doubt slower. Less about getting the book done. More about getting the book right. More about working together.
And emotions. Not long ago I was working on a book with an editor for quite a long while. When it was done, I felt compelled to ask (because I did not know), “What do you feel about the book?”
Maybe the “e” in e‑mail stands for “empty.”
4 thoughts on “A Life in Letters”
Oh, does this ring bells with me, Avi.
You are right. We rarely share emotion ns in our email communications, consequently they remain Empty.
WOW! A very powerful post, and oh so true. Collections of letters and notes received from former students, teachers, and authors always bring back memories of times shared and appreciated, as I come across them. Perhaps there will be a future renaissance of letter crafting, as there has been a resurgence in the understanding that holding a book in hand is worth 2 on a kindle.
Many of these changes in publishing happened very recently, if you count ten years (or even twenty) as recent. Going paperless, no reply means NO, agents as absolute requirement– all are not the way it was half a score ago.
I have a how-to (write and publish) children’s book that was given to me twenty years ago. It has a whole chapter on why you should TYPE the manuscript, (no hand written manuscripts, please) which now seems positively historic. Even then it felt like it referred to Jane Austen days, but was apparently still happening.