WORDS MATTER LETTER WRITING: A LOST ART? By John Harewood

Transcription

1 March 31, 2011 WORDS MATTER Even the charm of sending seasonal or birthday cards has faded, itself another victim of the culture of immediacy which has convinced Internet zealots that every message demands an instant response. LETTER WRITING: A LOST ART? By John Harewood There is a bareness about an age that has neither letter-writers nor biographers. Virginia Woolf, The Common Reader Series Harewood 1

2 Woolf was talking about the 17 th century, and perhaps it is too early to take her warning seriously, especially when it relates to letter writers. After all, we have only just completed the first decade of the twenty-first century, so it s neither the time nor place for dogmatic pronouncements. It is true that the traditional personal letter is under siege. The process of putting a pen to a sheet of paper, folding the finished manuscript, placing it in an envelope thereafter duly sealed, addressing it to the intended receiver, attaching a stamp in the right hand corner and slipping it into a mailbox, has lost its allure for millions. Even the charm of sending seasonal or birthday cards has faded, itself another victim of the culture of immediacy which has convinced Internet zealots that every message demands an instant response. But letter writing, despite our increasing preoccupation with tweeting and texting, retains its historic respectability. Two masters of old remind us. First, Cicero to Lucceius Antium, June, 56 B.C. I long to have my consulship written up by you as soon as possible. Not only am I seized with the hope of immortality in the praises of the ages to come, but I long while still alive to enjoy if it so be the authoritative expression of your judgment of my exploits, the proof of your kindly feeling toward me, or at least the charm of your native ability Hence, I ask you again and again to embellish that episode more than your opinions might warrant and in the process to put aside the rules of historical composition and grant a little more to your love for me than the truth might allow. I do not fear that I may seem to be a flatterer in fishing, as it were, for your favour when I show myself as being very eager to be praised by you; you are not the one to be ignorant of your own worth nor, on the other hand, am I so foolish to be willing to risk my reputation to one who would not himself gain honour in praising me. Marcus Tullius Cicero ( B.C.) Even the most skeptical observer, who in any century suspects the motives of politicians, would find the vanity of this request incredibly shocking. That the letter from which the excerpt is taken was not intended for publication would not reduce the contempt, although it might be conceded that it was written by a man who was considered a novus homo (new man), meaning that he was not a member of the aristocratic inner circle but nonetheless, as the first of his kind, Harewood 2

3 had achieved the highest political office in the state, the consulship (in 63 B.C.) during the most turbulent period in the history of the Roman Republic. He never allowed anyone to forget it. It was a period in which naked ambition was not discouraged, and while the display of arrogance was frowned upon, it rarely surprised one s friends or enemies. The preservation of one s dignity was far more important. Julius Caesar, the most renowned personality of the era, risked and lost his life on the famous Ides of March, in 44 B.C. to preserve his dignitas. And the same Cicero was executed the next year. But he did gain the immortality he sought, if not for his consulship, certainly as one of the greatest and most influential orators of all time: the individual whose elegance in language and style raised Latin to unprecedented heights, but above all, whose letter writing (900 have come down to us, but he wrote many more), showed the scope of the genre, its adaptability for topics from the personal (family and friendship) to art, theology, literature and philosophy. Next, the Younger Pliny, (circa A.D), landowner, prominent lawyer and administrator (with 247 private and 121 official letters). To read him is to see the letter once again as an agent of self-revelation, an opportunity for literary discussion with his peers, but also as an unbiased account of imperial Rome at the turn of the first century. It is to discover a fresh artistic quality in his description of the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius and its impact on the population in A.D.79. We had scarcely sat down to rest when darkness fell, not the dark of a moonless or cloudy night, but as if the lamp had been put out in a closed room. You could hear the shrieks of women, the wailing of infants, and the shouting of men; some were calling their parents, others their children or their wives, trying to recognize them by their voices. People bewailed their own fate or that of their relatives, and there were some who prayed for death in their terror of dying. Many besought the aid of the gods, but still more imagined there were no gods left, and that the universe was plunged into eternal darkness for evermore. Letters of the Younger Pliny, Book V1, 20. Now, place the passage just mentioned alongside the following additional evidence of the importance of the letter as an historical document. Harewood 3

4 For a moment, this is the line I have taken with all the persons brought before me on the charge of being Christians. I have asked them in person if they are Christians, and if they admit it, I repeat the question a second and third time, with a warning of the punishment awaiting them. If they persist, I order them to be led away for punishment; for, whatever the nature of their admission, I am convinced that their stubbornness and unshakeable obstinacy ought not to go unpunished. Letters of Pliny the Younger, Pliny to the Emperor Trajan Book X, Letter 96 circa 110 A.D. This letter is the primary source for the spread of Christianity in Asia Minor in the first two centuries and the official imperial policy towards its adherents. It may not be idle speculation that excerpts similar to the two just mentioned may have prompted the conclusion centuries later that Familiar letters written by eyewitnesses, and that, without design, disclose circumstances that let us more intimately into important events, are genuine history; and as far as they go, more satisfactory than formal premeditated narratives. Horace Walpole to Sir John Fenn, 29 June Long before my exposure to material of this kind, I began to conduct a love affair with letter writing. Already past the age of puberty, one day I saw a request for a pen pal in the local newspaper. Desperately hoping that it was from a girl, I immediately saw distant romance as a new adventure brimming with mystery and mystique. What would she be like? Would she like me? I would now have a trump card to be used, opportunely, to silence my male schoolmates, especially those who claimed superiority by boasting of their charms over the fairer sex. I would listen attentively, pretending to be impressed; then, I would nonchalantly inform them about my romantic interest overseas. When they denied my story, I would produce the most recent letter and rest my case. My hope and desire were short-lived. The signature at the end of the request was that of a boy. Still, that didn t dampen my excitement. I answered his letter immediately, listing details about my life which had suddenly become important: member of the Cadets, of the school choir, debating society; comic collector, reader and distributor; occasional short distance runner, cricket and soccer player; lover of languages and history; mathematical coward who exchanged smiles with a Harewood 4

5 hoped-for girlfriend in Sunday school. It didn t seem necessary to mention that my parents were married and that I was not a bastard, a name bearing a stigma inimical to one s social mobility in my island home. This is the first of two articles on letter writing. The next will return to Virginia Woolf as a starting point, highlight the artistic merit of some of her letters and include as well, references to Oscar Wilde and others whose practice of the genre gives it an enduring prominence in literature. John Harewood is a First Reads columnist, a literary critic and an educational and communications consultant. He is originally from Barbados but lives in Ottawa, Canada. Harewood 5