Do You Know The Answer?
Despite being what VH1 calls “the Goddess of Googling”, I’m having a heck of a time finding the answer to a question that’s been plaguing me today.
Now, to be fair, I didn’t wake up with a hangover this morning, despite having attended a party last night while VH stayed home to watch the Big-Eyed Boy. In fact, I was a good girl and was home by 8 pm after a mere two glasses of wine and asleep by 11 pm, perfectly sober. (I had work to do this morning and, besides, the one person whose company I most crave wasn’t there.)
Anyway.
I’m trying to compile a list, preferably with book titles or other readable references, of famous correspondents. By that I mean, people who — back in the day — wrote snail mail to each other which became noteworthy literature in its own right.
Can anyone come up with some names?
Anyone? Anyone??? Buehler???
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some good info here
http://www.neh.gov/projects/papersprojects.html
John and Abigail Adams
Ron and Nancy Reagan
That’s all I got.
Virginia Wolfe wrote to tons of people.
George Sand wrote to… someone famous… forget who.
I’m pretty sure you oould hit paydirt with one of the Bronte girls.
Oscar Wilde.
No book titles, though. I just know these people were very fond of writing letters.
Two books of letters to and from Gustave Flaubert have been published. You can read his correspondence with George Sand here. In the 1980s, a collection of Flaubert’s correspondence with Ivan Turgenev was published.
Then there was the 20-year Helene Hanff/Frank Doel correspondence, published as 84, Charing Cross Road (the address of Doel’s employer, Marks & Co.), though Doel, the buyer for Marks’ bookshop, was not identified in the early going.
Richard Hugo’s letters always stand out to me.
But his letters were always one-way, and poetry at that.
Still and all, good stuff.
Emily Dickinson was quite a correspondence author, as I recall.
Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning, before they married?
Paul the Apostle.
(snicker)
Helene Hanff and Frank Doel.
She wrote the book which Mel Brooks produced as a movie: 84 Charing Cross Road
Heloise and Abelard?
William T Sherman (the general) and John Sherman (the Senator). Used to have a copy of THE SHERMAN LETTERS floating around, but it’s gone now, unfortunately.
C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.
Gah, Timmer, I can’t believe I didn’t think of those two; they’re two of my favorite authors!
DOH! I hadn’t even realized they corresponded!
These are all great suggestions, folks. Thank you so much.
Here’s a good jumping off point, Kate:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inklings
That is EXACTLY what I was looking for. Thanks, WG!