“Three days ago I was at a Christmas party for the insane, held in the violent ward. Too bad you weren’t there.”
– Anton Chekhov (1860—1904), from a letter to Alexander Chekhov (1855—1913), Yalta, dated December 30, 1893, in: “The Selected Letters of Anton Chekhov”, translated from the Russian by Sidonie Lederer
“… dear soul, let that which secretly binds us never pass away. God, let no-one dare tear it asunder. I’ll guard this secret so that no-one will find it out. After all I won’t harm anyone by loving you so unutterably…
With everyone else I’ve stood as if behind a fence; and when standing with you I want there to be not a hair’s breadth between us. You can have me whole, dear soul, and please give yourself whole to me in the same way.”
– Leos Janacek (1854—1928), from a letter to Kamila Stosslova (1891—1935), dated April 30, 1927, in: “Intimate Letters: Leoš Janáček to Kamila Janáček”, translated by John Tyrrell
“You must know that you do not take me away from anywhere, that I am already taken away from every place in the world and from myself toward a single one, where I never arrive. (What cowardice to tell you this!)”
– Marina Tsvetaeva (1892—1941), from a letter to Abram Vishnyak (1895—1943), from “Florentine nights. Nine Letters With a Tenth Kept Back and an Eleventh Received”, in: “Readings: The Poetics of Blanchot, Joyce, Kafka, Kleist, Lispector, and Tsvetayeva” by H. Cixous, translated from the French by Verena A. Conley
“I will always be a friend of yours, you ought never to doubt that.”
– Germaine de Staël (1766—1817), from a letter to Benjamin Constant (1767—1830), London, dated January 23, 1814, in: “Madame de Staël. Selected correspondence”, translated from the French by Kathleen Jameson-Cemper
“You and I never believed in our meeting here on earth, any more than we believed in life on this earth, isn’t that so?
I kiss you… on the lips? on the temple? on the forehead? Of course on the lips, for real, as if alive.”
– Marina Tsvetaeva (1892—1941), from a letter to Rainer Maria Rilke (1875—1926), the letter she wrote after he died, dated December 31, 1926-February 8, 1927, in: “Letters. Summer 1926. Boris Pasternak. Marina Tsvetaeva, Rainer Maria Rilke”, translated by Margaret Wettlin, Walter Arndt, Jamey Gambrell
“I’ve been carrying around a pile of letters I wrote to you. It’s a lot of writing, because except for my travel days I write to you every night. I shouldn’t load you down like that, but though I’m thinking about you the entire day, at night my memory of you becomes so intense that I can’t do anything else but write to you. It’s like a compulsion.”
– Gabriela Mistral (1889—1957), from a letter to Doris Dana (1920—2006), dated December 5, 1949, in: “Gabriela Mistral’s Letters to Doris Dana”, translated by Velma Garcia-Gorena
“Your letter, my dear, was received this morning, and I assure you the expressions of sympathy and love running through its pages but add to the deep love I bear you.”
– Nathaniel Dawson (1829—1895), from a letter to Elodie Todd (1840—1877), Manassas Junction, dated September 2, 1861, in: “Practical Strangers. The Courtship Correspondence of Nathaniel Dawson and Elodie Todd, Sister of Mary Todd Lincoln”, edited by Stephen Berry and Angela Esco Elder
“Treasure, my beloved, you only ever write very little about yourself now. I beg you, write to me about everything, don’t spare me, because I want to be your trusted friend.”
– Marie Bader (1886—1942), from a letter to Ernst Löwy (1880—1943), Prague, dated March 12, 1942, in: “Life and Love in Nazi Prague. Letters from an Occupied City. Marie Bader”, translated by Kate Ottevang
“I want only to have company and I want to have somewhere to go ‘home’ to; and where else but to you can I go ‘home’?”
– Leos Janacek (1854—1928), from a letter to Kamila Stosslova (1891—1935), dated March 25, 1927, in: “Intimate Letters: Leoš Janáček to Kamila Janáček”, translated by John Tyrrell
“… My problem is that I have nothing external; all heart and fate.”
– Marina Tsvetaeva (1892—1941), from a letter to Vera Merkurieva (1876—1943), dated August 31, 1940, in “A Captive Lion. The Life Of Marina Tsvetaeva”, by Elaine Feinstein
“Do you ever really miss me dearest one, or do you just think of me as a bit of the past?”
– Elsie Rosaline Masson (1890—1935), from a letter to Bronislaw Malinowski (1884—1942), dated June 18, 1934, in: “The Story of a Marriage. The Letters of Bronislaw Malinowski and Elsie Masson”
“Come back, come back, I cry and cry.
Tell me to come join you and I’ll come…
Where will you go?
What will you do?”
– Arthur Rimbaud (1854—1891), from a letter to his Paul Verlaine (1844—1896), dated July 4, 1873, in: “I Promise to be Good. The Letters of Arthur Rimbaud”, translated from the French by Watt Mason
“Why is it that only my silence means something, and necessarily something bad? But it really doesn’t matter; it always has and always will be this way.”
– Boris Pasternak (1890—1960), from a letter to his Aunt Asya, Moscow, dated January 14, 1936, in: “The Correspondence of Boris Pasternak and Olga Freidenberg, 1910—1954″, translated from the Russian by Elliott Mossman and Margaret Wettlin
“I always like you to write just as you feel. Such letters are pleasant even in their sadness as they convince me of your love and confidence. I love to be sad at times. It is a pleasure to think of sad things. Never let the fear of affecting me control your feelings. I always wish them to be outspoken. I am always candid with you and tell you what I feel and think. Your letters are a comfort and a solace, even one line. If you saw me nightly kissing your miniature, you would know that I was in love. I think last at night and first in the morning of my God and you, my dear…”
– Nathaniel Dawson (1829—1895), from a letter to Elodie Todd (1840—1877), Manassas Junction, dated September 2, 1861, in: “Practical Strangers. The Courtship Correspondence of Nathaniel Dawson and Elodie Todd, Sister of Mary Todd Lincoln”, edited by Stephen Berry and Angela Esco Elder
“What is it to forget a human being? – It is to forget what one suffered through him.”
– Marina Tsvetaeva (1892—1941), from a letter to Abram Vishnyak (1895—1943), dated 1922, in: “Florentine nights. Nine Letters With a Tenth Kept Back and an Eleventh Received”, quoted by H. Cixous, in “Readings: The Poetics of Blanchot, Joyce, Kafka, Kleist, Lispector, and Tsvetayeva”, translated from the French by Verena A. Conley
“… I am completely and irrevocably knocked off balance, because I am so tired that my mind and nerves are shattered. I am saying straight forward: I would prefer your society to anyone else’s, if I were at all capable of social intercourse. I can do two things: I can write, in order not to die of hunger, and I can play bridge, in order not to be left with my or others thoughts. …I’m like a victim of shell-shock. To sit in one place for more than an hour is real torture. I, you understand, have become incapable of conversing. If only I could quit the