17 January (1918): Rudyard Kipling to J.H.C. Brooking
"I have had some experience in the unauthorized use of my verses, but I confess that what you have done is outside all my experience..."
16 January (1854): Jane Welsh Carlyle to Mary Smith
Mary Smith (1822-89) was a schoolmistress, poet, lecturer, and journalist who took part in local politics, lectured, gave public readings, took up the women’s cause...
15 January (1849) Charlotte Brontë to Ellen Nussey
"The days pass in a slow, dark march; the nights are the test; the sudden wakings from restless sleep, the revived knowledge that one lies...
14 January (1823): Mary Shelley to Jane Williams
Below, a lengthy letter from Mary Shelley to Jane Williams detailing, among other things, feelings of isolation while living in Italy after the death of...
11 January (1897): Lewis Carroll to May Barber
Below, Lewis Carroll explains in few words his nonsense poem “The Hunting of the Snark.” The letter is addressed to a young girl, May Barber,...
10 January (1878): Emily Dickinson to Mary Bowles
Below is the letter Emily wrote to her close friend Mary Bowles after her husband Samuel’s death.
9 January (1961): J.R. Ackerley to Francis King
J. R. Ackerley writes to Francis King from Thailand, sharing impressions of Bangkok interlaced with grisly, unabashed racism and pretty turns of phrase.
8 January (1960): Rebecca West to Henry Andrews
In early 1960, at the behest of the Sunday Times, Rebecca West undertook a three-month tour of South Africa. Below, West—just beginning her stay in...
7 January (1902): Joseph Conrad to David S. Meldrum
And perhaps true literature (when you “get it”) is something like a disease which one feels in one’s bones, sinews and joints...
4 January (1970): Kenneth Tynan to William Shawn
Below, theater critic and writer Kenneth Tynan reaches out to New Yorker editor William Shawn, regarding potential pieces on Paul McCartney, Harold Pinter, and Czech writer Antonin...
3 January (1951): Robert Graves to D. S. Savage
"Yes, isn't a conscience a damned nuisance? Here I am spending 18 or 20 months on a book that will bring me in 4 months'...
2 January (1857): Leo Tolstoy to Count S. N. Tolstoy
In the letter below, a twenty-eight-year-old Tolstoy responds to his relative’s accusation that he behaves inconsistently. He confesses “remorse” for being unable to break ties...
28 December (1944): J. R. R. Tolkien to Christopher Tolkien
Below, J. R. R. Tolkien to his son Christopher, discussing new chapters of his Lord of the Rings trilogy; a beautiful, disquieting Christmas experience; and the hatred...
27 December (1969): Kingsley Amis to Encounter
Below, Kingsley Amis responds to Donald Davie’s “Hobbits and Intellectuals,” which took a previous piece by Amis (about a political dispute with a pseudonymous “R”),...
26 December (1939): John Cheever to Elizabeth Ames
"The local squire showed up with a jar of aspic, the children began to destroy the tree ornaments, and driving home the moon was as...
24 December (1787): Mary Wollstonecraft to Joseph Johnson
Joseph Johnson was a London-based bookseller and publisher famous (notorious) for printing the work of intellectual ‘radicals’ such as William Godwin, Joseph Priestly, William Blake...
21 December (1954): P. G. Wodehouse to Denis Mackail
Below, a short letter from P. G. Wodehouse to English novelist Denis Mackail, on the loathsomeness of the BBC and “louse” Max Beerbohm. TO...
20 December (1931): Samuel Beckett to Thomas McGreevy
Below, Samuel Beckett writes to poet Thomas McGreevy on melancholy, the sexually “potent” Christ (“Xist”) of Perugino’s Pietà, and his dislike for Stendhal. TO THOMAS MCGREEVY...
19 December (1933): John Fante to Mary Capolungo Fante
Below, novelist John Fante (channeling, it would seem, his fictional alter-ego, Arturo Bandini), writes to his mother, discussing his struggle to launch himself as a...
18 December (1907): Edith Wharton to Sara Norton
Below, Edith Wharton writes to close friend Sara Norton about her transatlantic voyage to Paris, on the occasion of The House of Mirth‘s appearance in French. ...
17 December (1922): Edna St. Vincent Millay to Arthur Davidson Ficke
"Is this a snippy letter, dear?—No, it isn’t. I shall love you till the day I die.—Though I shan’t always be thinking about it, thank...
14 December (1957): Flannery O'Connor to Betty Hester
"About the Lourdes business. I am going as a pilgrim, not a patient. I will not be taking any bath. I am one of those...
13 December (1909): James Joyce to Nora Barnacle Joyce
In the letter below, James Joyce writes to his wife Nora about his private unmet needs...
12 December (1939): Hermann Hesse to Max Herrmann-Neisse
In this letter from 1939, Hermann Hesse writes to his friend Max Herrmann-Neisse, expressing his concern for friends living in Poland and Prague, and explaining...
