Love Letters: Kurt Vonnegut

We seem to be getting farther and farther away from that Keatsian love that is so utterly romantic in every over-used sense of the word. But here I share some snippets of letters written by Kurt Vonnegut (this book just came out and I'm dying to read it!).

To his first wife/high school sweetheart while away for work (they later separated, but I like to think this isn't just word fluff):

Dearest Jane:

Your charming package of messages arrive this morning, made my love and loneliness acute. Such pang. I'm a homesick little boy. . . . There are alleys everywhere. I had forgotten how romantic alleys are.

This is a very unique "love" letter, and I think it still counts for our purposes. Vonnegut wrote a lovely letter to his students that was instructions for their term papers. I can't think of a better way to tell your students that you care about their work, progress, labors of love than a letter instead of instructions:

 Beloved:

This course began as Form and Theory of Fiction, became Form of Fiction, then Form and Texture of Fiction, the Surface Criticism, or Hot to Talk our of the Corner of Your Mouth Like a Real Tough Pro. 

. . . .

I want you to adore the Universe, to be easily delight, but to be prompt as well with impatience with those artists who often your own deep notions of what the Universes is or should be. "This above all..."

. . . .

The grades should be childishly selfish and impudent measures of your own joy or lack of it. I don't care what grades you give. I do insist that you like some stories better than others.

. . . .

[Write not] as an academic critic, nor a person drunk on art, nor as a barbarian in the literary market place. Do so as a sensitive person who has practical hunches. . . . Be yourself. Be unique. Be a good editor.

Lovely, yes? I very different idea of love letters is starting to form in this series, and I have to say,  I very much like it.

Photo via 

Love Letters: John + Abigail Adams

Last week we read the love letters of John Keats and Fanny Brawne, and they are unbearable dear. This week we look at one of the truest real relationships: John and Abigail Adams (portrayed beautifully in the HBO miniseries) have a correspondence that can only be described as common-sensical. Their love is obvious, not flowery, not extravagant. They speak of health, average daily routines. In some ways the opposite of Keats and Brawne, their relationship just works.

Abigail writes to John:

My wishes for your Health and happiness and my anxiety to hear from you are an old Story. Should I tender you my warmest affections, they are of a date, almost with my first knowledge of you, and near coeval with myexistance, yet not the less valuable I hope to a Heart that know now a change, but is unalterably the treasure of its ever affectionate...

They are practical; they are honest. It is a simple, pure relationship that seems to stand the test of time, Declarations and civil unrest, and many miles. Beautiful, is it not?

More of their letters can be enjoyed here.

Photo still of HBO miniseries via

Love Letters: Keats & Brawne

It's February and love certainly seems to be in the air. I'm conveniently reading Romantic poets in an English course, snow flakes are fair and frosty on lashes, and coffee shops are playing affectionate tunes. So, dear readers, I invite you to read some of the sweetest love letters ever penned. The lovely John Keats (one of my favorite poets) wrote the most heartbreakingly beautiful letters to his "sweet girl," "fair Star," Fanny Brawne. One of my favorite passages:

I am almost astonished that any absent one should have that luxurious power over my senses which I feel. Even when I am not thinking of you I receive your influence and a tender nature stealing upon me. All my thoughts, my unhappiest days and nights have I find not at all cured me of my love of Beauty, but made it so intense that I am miserable that you are not with me.

 More of the letters can be found here. Read them and your heart will glow, your eyes will sparkle. I am now inclined to read this poem and re-watch the delicate romance film based on John Keats and Fanny Brawne's romance, Bright Star. Swoon.

Photo still of Bright Star film via