I’m yours. I’m waiting.”
– Arthur Rimbaud (1854—1891), from a letter to his Paul Verlaine (1844—1896), dated July 7, 1873, in: “I Promise to be Good. The Letters of Arthur Rimbaud”, translated from the French by Watt Mason
“… you won’t rest easy, not until you save the soul from which you may hang and depend. Even if it only means saving him from himself, and with more reason if he has no enemies except for those within himself. Why should you want anything other than to make a man happy, a man to whom you gave happiness and who taught you to receive happiness from his hand? All the rest will mature in him, for you, because of him, with him, by way of him.”
– Gabriela Mistral (1889—1957), from a letter to Victoria Ocampo (1890—1979), Argentina, dated April, 1938, in: “This America Of Ours. The Letters of Gabriela Mistral and Victoria Ocampo”, translated from the Spanish by Elizabeth Horan and Doris Meyer
“My Own Boy, Your sonnet is quite lovely, and it is a marvel that those red roseleaf lips of yours should have been made no less for music and song than for madness of kissing.”
– Oscar Wilde (1854—1900), from a letter to Alfred Douglas (1870—1945), Babbacombe Cliff, dated January, 1893, in “Oscar Wilde: A Life In Letters”
“There is so much in life that does not lend itself to definition, analysis, even translation into human language. This has been true of much, very much, of my life in recent years.”
– Olga Freidenberg (1890—1955), from a letter to Boris Pasternak (1890—1960), St. Petersburg, dated July 12, 1910, in: “The Correspondence of Boris Pasternak and Olga Freidenberg, 1910—1954″, translated from the Russian by Elliott Mossman and Margaret Wettlin
“My beloved one, I don’t know why I waited so long before saying I loved you. I just wanted to be sure and not to say easy, empty words. But it seems to me now love was there since the beginning. Anyway, now it is here, it is love and my heart aches. I am happy to be so bitterly unhappy because I know you are unhappy, too, and it is sweet to have part of the same sadness. With you pleasure was love, and now pain is love too. We must know every kind of love. We’ll know the joy of meeting again. I want it, I need it, and I’ll get it. Wait for me. I wait for you. I love you more even than I said, more maybe than you know. I’ll write very often. Write to me very often too.”
– Simone de Beauvoir (1908—1986), from a letter to Nelson Algren (1909—1981), dated May 18, 1947, in: “A Transatlantic Love Affair. Letters to Nelson Algren” (https://archive.nytimes.com/)
“So your poor leggies have again hurt you, very naughty of them – I wish I were there to have rubbed them at least!”
– Tsesarevich Nikolay Alexandrovich (the future last Emperor of all Russia, Nikolay II, 1868—1918), from a letter to his future wife, Princess Alix of Hesse and by Rhine at birth (the future last Empress of Russia, 1872—1918), dated August 3, 1894
“You claim that my letters are more beautifully written and better composed than yours, but that’s not true. Haven’t you noticed how in a few words you can usually deal with a matter, whereas I need so many?”
– Marie Bader (1886—1942), from a letter to Ernst Löwy (1880—1943), Karlín, dated September 25, 1941, in: “Life and Love in Nazi Prague. Letters from an Occupied City. Marie Bader”, translated by Kate Ottevange
“I’m writing to you because I don’t have anyone to send these lines so they’ll be read, and yet unread because unanswered. So it’s like a stone falling into the water. It’s like talking to myself, feeling sorry for myself, cheering myself up.”
– Leos Janacek (1854—1928), from a letter to Kamila Stosslova (1891—1935), dated September 9, 1918, in: “Intimate Letters: Leoš Janáček to Kamila Janáček”, translated by John Tyrrell
“I feel such terrible pangs when you write how much you want me, and I also feel I have rather cat-and-moused you by saying one time I was coming, and the next time not, and so on.”
– Elsie Rosaline Masson (1890—1935), from a letter to Bronislaw Malinowski (1884—1942), dated October 21, 1927, in: “The Story of a Marriage. The Letters of Bronislaw Malinowski and Elsie Masson”
“There are different ways of being busy. Mine is unnatural. It is a blend of the darkest disquiet, which I suffer from because of trivialities that I shouldn’t be busying myself with, of complete hopelessness, of neurasthenic fears and of helpless endeavours. My wing has been broken.”
– Mikhail Bulgakov (1891—1940), from a letter to Vikenty Veresayev (1867—1945),Moscow, dated July 22—28, 1931, in: “Manuscripts don’t burn: Mikhail Bulgakov, a life in letters and diaries”, edited by J.A.R.Curtis
“Sometimes I have the feeling that there is a great mass of unspoken words between us which here and there threatens to rear itself into a wall between us.”
– Marie Bader (1886—1942), in a letter to Ernst Löwy (1880—1943), Karlín, dated December 24,1941, in: “Life and Love in Nazi Prague. Letters from an Occupied City. Marie Bader”, translated by Kate Ottevange
“What beautiful verses you sent me! Their rhythm is as soft as the caresses of your voice when you mix my name with your tender chirping. Allow me to find them the most beautiful of your verses…”
– Gustave Flaubert (1821—1880), from a letter to Louise Colet (1810—1876), in: “Rage and fire: a life of Louise Colet, pioneer feminist, literary star, Flaubert’s muse” by Francine du Plessix Gray
“Your letter has just been put into my hands (Friday morning). I read it & lay it down & answer it at once, for at the close of the week I am never so much my own master as at the beginning & as I can only write a short letter now I will postpone a more full reply till Monday.”
– John Miller (1819—1895), from a letter to Sally Campbell Preston McDowell (1821—1895), Philadelphia, February 16, 1855, in: “If You Love That Lady Don’t Marry Her: The Courtship Letters of Sally Mcdowell and John Miller, 1854—1856″
“I kiss you on the abdomen – a long long fervent kiss – ”
– Alfred Stieglitz (1864—1946), from a letter to Georgia O’Keeffe (1887—1986), Lake George, New York, dated June 23, 1929, in: “My Faraway One. Selected Letters of Georgia O’Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz. Volume 1, 1915—1933″
“Let’s hope that fate, at least one more time before I close my eyes forever, might want to be kind to me and lead you back to me, so that I may get back one reason for living, which now is missing completely.”
– Luigi Pirandello (1867—1936), from a letter to Marta Abba (1900—1988), dated March 14, 1929, in: “Pirandello’s Love Letters to Marta Abba”, translated from the Italian by Benito Ortolani
“Most dear little being,
I miss you. I’ve received all your little letters safely, and you’re very sweet to have been such a good correspondent. But it really grieves me to feel you so glum, there far away, and to be glum myself here.”
– Simone de Beauvoir (1908—1986), from a letter to Jean-Paul Sartre (1905—1980), Paris, dated 5 July, 1939, in “Letters to Sartre”, translated from the French by Quintin Hoare
“I have