Yours Ever: People and Their Letters

by Thomas Mallon

A delightful investigation of the art of letter writing, Yours Ever explores masterpieces dispatched through the ages by messenger, postal service, and BlackBerry.
 
Here are Madame de Sévigné’s devastatingly sharp reports from the French court, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s tormented advice to his young daughter, the casually brilliant musings of Flannery O’Connor, the lustful boastings of Lord Byron, and the prison cries of Sacco and Vanzetti, all accompanied by Thomas Mallon’s own insightful commentary. From battlefield confessions to suicide notes, fan letters to hate mail, Yours Ever is an exuberant reintroduction to a vast and entertaining literature—a book that will help to revive, in the digital age, this glorious lost art.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Writing, Biography, Books About Books, Essays, Anthologies

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Thomas Mallon is an American novelist, essayist, and critic. His novels are renowned for their attention to historical detail and context and for the author's crisp wit and interest in the "bystanders" to larger historical events. He is the author of ten books of fiction, including Henry and Clara, Two Moons, Dewey Defeats Truman, Aurora 7, Bandbox, Fellow Travelers (recently adapted into a miniseries by the same name), Watergate, Finale, Landfall, and most recently Up With the Sun. He has also published nonfiction on plagiarism (Stolen Words), diaries (A Book of One's Own), letters (Yours Ever) and the John F. Kennedy assassination (Mrs. Paine's Garage), as well as two volumes of essays (Rockets and Rodeos and In Fact).
He is a former literary editor of Gentleman's Quarterly, where he wrote the "Doubting Thomas" column in the 1990s, and has contributed frequently to The New Yorker, The New York Times Book Review, The Atlantic Monthly, The American Scholar, and other periodicals. He was appointed a member of the National Council on the Humanities in 2002 and served as Deputy Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities from 2005 to 2006.
His honors include Guggenheim and Rockefeller fellowships, the National Book Critics Circle citation for reviewing, and the Vursell prize of the American Academy of Arts and Letters for distinguished prose style. He was elected as a new member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2012.

Reviews

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thomas Mallon's previous book about people and their diaries ("A Book of One's Own") was extraordinary - it set the standard by which any other books on the topic should be judged. It didn't seem possible for his subsequent book on plagiarism ("Stolen Words") to reach the same level of excellence, but it did.

It's perhaps not altogether surprising that this latest book didn't match the brilliance of the earlier two (if nothing else, the statistical phenomenon of regression toward the mean would be expected to take effect at some point). It's not that this is a bad book - it's just not particularly interesting. Mallon appears to have dragged out the writing over a period of 15 years, which conveys the definite impression that he just lost interest. It's unclear why he would think the reader's reaction would be any different. In fact, the lukewarm nature of his introduction (to his own book ) suggests that he knows that the book fails to reach his earlier standards.

The book's content is roughly one third direct quotation from various letters, flanked by Mallon's introduction and commentary. The 300 or so pages of text are divided into nine thematic groupings: Absence, Friendship, Advice, Complaint, Love, Spirit, Confession, War, and Prison.

In general, the book would have benefitted had Mallon opted for more extensive quotation from fewer correspondents. Many of the people from whose letters he quotes are just not all that interesting, and his bridging text does not make it adequately clear why they have been chosen for inclusion. The inevitable result is that the reader is left wishing that the witless had been sacrificed to make room for more material from those with genuine wit and insight.

I find it hard to summon up more than two stars. An infinitely better book is the collection edited by Andrew Carroll, "Letters of a Nation", published in 1997. It's interesting to note that this is the year that Mallon had targeted for initial publication of this book. He just plain missed the boat.

[Tracey · Rating 4 out of 5]

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Not What I Expected, But Still a Wonderful Read, January 15, 2010

Yours Ever was not the book I expected it to be. I thought it would be a collection of letters from a variety of people and characters throughout history along with brief asides, historical commentary, and the like by Thomas Mallon. Instead Yours Ever is organized in thematic chapters on nine broad topics like Friendship, Advice, and War. Also, it does not include full reprints of letters, but instead utilizes block quotes interspersed with historical information and commentary about the function of letters in that particular period or setting.

While it was not what I expected it to be at all, it is still a lovely read. The thematic organiztion works well as Mallon is able to combine a variety of historical people and settings within one chapter, and it is marvelous to see the similarities and differences between two nineteenth century African-American women writing to one another and two wealthy American and European women writing to each other in the twentieth century.

Yours Ever is lengthy and full of details without being long-winded. I found myself rereading certain quotes and passages from letters that were especially memorable. Mallon's historical details are also spot on. They provide enough context to gain a greater understanding of the letters and their writers without being distracting from the subject of letter writing.

While I very much enjoyed reading this book I'm glad I borrowed it from the library instead of purchasing it; I'm not sure that it has a high reread value. However, if I were still enrolled in grad school the reread and research potential would be greatly increased and it would then be a book worth purchasing.

Also, the extensive bibliography is great if you are looking for further reading on this subject.

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

I do like reading collections of letters and have greatly enjoyed collections from Robertson Davies, Flannery O'Connor, Evelyn Waugh. Mallon's book is a thematic excursion through some great letter writers (though Mallon is unafraid of bringing up the whiny and the contemptible as well). The chapter titles are wonderful and organize the book: absence, friendship, advice, complaint, love, spirit, confession, war, and prison. His comments are thoughtful and wry and a delight to dip into. This is not an anthology but it does make me want to read more letters and write some more of my own. I read his book of commentary on diary's, A Book of One's Own, from 25 years ago and have pulled it off the shelf again for another go round.

[Eric Woodard · Rating 2 out of 5]

It felt like a series of small essays about letters very loosely connected. It had very little narrative drive, and he was bad at making me care about the letters of anyone I wasn't already familiar with. I loved the sections about F. Scott Fitzgerald and Oscar Wilde, but he just assumed we knew of everybody he wrote about, so he didn't try to build any interest in them. Occasionally fascinating, often boring and poorly structured.

[Marsha Rafalski · Rating 3 out of 5]

(3.5 rounded to 3.0.

This book is a homage to letter writing and receiving. The author has chronicled and explored the art of letter writing through the ages. Roughly half of the book is direct quotations from letters of mostly well known people and half a scholarly discussion on the mechanics of composing letters of note. Using nine thematic groupings: Absence, Friendship, Advice, Complaint, Love, Spirit, Confession, War, and Prison, Mallon provides examples of both positive and negative aspects of letters. This book leans toward the scholarly reader with its extensive analysis of what makes a letter memorable and why such letters should be kept. The best portions of the book is found in the letters themselves and skimming through the commentary

[Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

This author, a frequent contributor to both The New Yorker and The New York Times Book Review, was unknown to me until I read a review of his recently-published diaries that appeared in the latter periodical. I've always liked the subject of "letters" and Mallon quotes some great ones from correspondents both famous and unknown. What I particularly liked about this treatment of the subject was the way he categorized his chapters - letters on "Apologies," letters written from "Prison," letters written about the experience of "War," and so on.

[Jen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don’t understand why the author told us about the letters rather than having a short biographical introduction and then letting the letters speak for themselves. Also, the people he chose to spotlight seemed chosen completely randomly.

[Bookmarks Magazine · Rating 4 out of 5]

When Mallon began this book in the early 1990's, he could not have foreseen the detrimental effect technology would have on his subject, and his inspired selections, perceptive explanations, and fascinating asides left critics feeling rather nostalgic for this moribund, if celebrated, art. Straightforward and sensible, Mallon resists the temptation to psychoanalyze these writers, preferring instead to let them speak eloquently for themselves--although critics agreed that his own prose is every bit as moving. The only complaints arose from Mallon's lack of chronological or geographical organization, but no critic was too concerned about it. In Yours Ever, Mallon takes readers on "a virtual tour of the human condition" (New York Times Book Review), reminding us all of the power and importance of the humble letter. This is an excerpt from a review published in Bookmarks magazine.

[Philip Shaw · Rating 3 out of 5]

In Mallon's attempt to consolidate should a broad and rich subject as the epistole of our great thinkers and writers, he delivers the prescriptive rather than a contemplative view of the form, historic and current. These attempts to elucidate only exaggerate the impenetrable that is caused by leaving too much out and offering too much in. And while I have a lot of respect for Mallon, (as a curator on the topic, he is obviously incredible!), and I did enjoy this work on certain levels, the erudition he adds is overwhelming to the text adding another level of inaccessibility.

These chapters, curated under common archetypes and handled as they were ��� could have been entire books unto themselves. By condensing them a great injustice was done to the idea of illumination on the proposed dusk of these great likenesses we have offered to one another and often leave behind.

Philip Swanstrom Shaw

[Charlene · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting book. I picked it up a few weeks ago and couldn't seem to get going with it but a long weekend with bad weather gave me the time and patience to appreciate it. Subtitle, "People and Their Letters", generally means literary people, occasionally historical political figures. This is also a book about letters, a bit about the people who wrote them, but seldom includes more than a line or two of the letters themselves. That's generally okay with me and has even made me think about looking for some of the collections of letters mentioned in the book, particularly Flannery O'Connor's. The Friendship chapter is my favorite, particulary reading about the correspondence between Mary McCarthy and Hannah Arendt. I enjoyed learning new things about famous folks I didn't know and I discovered a new poet, Philip Larkin, that I will try reading.

[Elisha Condie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Heard this one reviewed on NPR and thought it sounded wonderful. Thank heavens I didn't buy it, because it's mostly boring and only a tiny bit wonderful.
Mallon has taken letters from famous people and described them and organized them into chapters on themes like friendship, love, war, prison, etc. I just keep shaking my head, wondering how it sounded so interesting on the radio and in real life it was just so hard to get through. The excerpts from Wallis Simpson's letters were among the more interesting.
Although slow, the book has inspired me to write more letters. Or any letters, for that matter. I just thought this book was a disappointment, it could have been so much more.

[Ben · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was pretty disappointing. I had high hopes because I'm a big fan of written letters but the book is more stories of people who wrote letters and little of the actual letters. It's limited to a few quotes from an actual letter and a couple pages about the story of the letters back and forth. Also, the author uses some ridiculous vocabulary. I'll share a few of his greatest hits.

pulchritudinous: physically beautiful; comely.
impecuniously: having little or no money; penniless; poor.
treacly: contrived or unrestrained sentimentality.
animadversions: the act of criticizing.
unhagiographical: couldn't actually find a definition of this one but I'm guessing it means not hagiographical, hagiography: the writing and critical study of the lives of the saints; hagiology.

[Adrian]

Quite brilliant 2 to 3 page profiles of famous letter writers. And not so famous. Whether it's old favourites we already knew like Sullivan Ballou, Helen Hanff or Mark Twain or new found gems like Noel Coward, S.J. Perelman or Neal Cassady, Mallon's effective in getting to the inner essence of the writer. He reveals the nastiness of Ayn Rand, the selfishness of Gerard Manley Hopkins as neatly as he opens up the greatness of Oscar Wilde and Abe Lincoln. His opinions are not mushy as he shows in his surprising verdict on Philip Larkin. Perhaps best of all he leaves the reader wanting more, for me it's Charles Lamb.

[Kristin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well, it took me three weeks to read. That should say it all. It was very interesting. And the writing was good enough. But, this book is about letters. It is about the power of the written word. The snippets he provides as examples intermixed with his biographical commentaries just make you want to put his book down and go find the letter anthologies to read. Personally, I would've liked more of the actual letters and less of his interpretations.

It was fun to read these mini-biographies and learn a tiny bit about a lot of people, but overall, this book was rather burdensome, and I think, missed its mark.

You don't need to rush out to read this one.

[Gloria · Rating 2 out of 5]

Am only giving this book a lower rating simply because it did not meet my particular expectations as to what it was. This is a historical compilation of letters from people in the 1400s onward. There are many interesting tidbits and factoids about famous historical people. The chapters are divided into the following subjects: war, prison, absence, friendship, advice, complaint, love, spirit, and confession. It has a decidedly intellectual tone and unfortunately not all that much that might really inspire one to pen a letter in current times.

[Jeff Russo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this up because when reading about various authors, their personal letters often seem more interesting than their books. If you've noticed that too then you'll like this book.

It doesn't provide large sections of letters, often just a sentence or two plucked here and there to illustrate themes in the subject's letter writing.

Some of the chosen people were a bit obscure, but the book does not claim to only be about superstars (though many superstars are represented).

[Elizabeth Davidson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not a quick read (obviously) but the work Mallon put into this made it thoughtful and insightful. A glimpse into some of our most famous minds, and some lesser known, this book is entirely about the human condition. The regularity behind the 'big' moments of life shines through - letters from home in war, letters of love between friends and family, reveals the soft, warm, and sad parts of who we are as individuals.

[M · Rating 2 out of 5]

"A reader craves some sparkling artifice, not just sense and precision." Though the author of this book wrote it, he doesn't seem to realize it. This book is just about some letters - it's an overview of an assortment of letters written at various times. It's not revelatory, conclusive, or even exhaustive. It doesn't have a historical angle, or really any kind of thesis. Unfortunately, it didn't teach me much or inspire me, nothing sparked or sparkled, so I think it's one to pass over.

[Donna Jo Atwood · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is not about how to write letters, but about letters that prolific letter writers have written. Each chapter (Love Letters, letters of advice, letters of complaint, etc.) contains several sections devoted to individual writers. I was disappointed that there were only very small excerpts from any one writer. There are several people whose collected letters I would like to read.

[Gloria · Rating 2 out of 5]

This should have been titled Yours Ever: The Author and His Essays of Well-Known Peoples' Letters.
A bit of a disappointment in that the letters (of which there are some brilliant ones) do not make up the bulk of this book. I felt like I was being teased with cunning wit and prose of the letter writer, only to have it snatched away and being forced to read the boring commentary of Mr. Mallon.

[Jenna Zarzycki · Rating 2 out of 5]

I began this book and then ended up putting it down very quickly. I usually love epistolary fiction/non-fiction. My complaint here was that the author gave too much history and background and not enough text of the actual letters. It was like getting to smell something delicious but never actually being able to taste it!

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must-read if you are a letterphile, a book nerd, or love history. The scope of the letters discussed and the humor with which Mallon confronts historical greats is delightful. I picked it up and finished in two days flat, even though it's a dense read.

[Jody · Rating 3 out of 5]

Heard about this book through NPR. Though it was not what I expected, there are some great sections, including detail on Jung and Freud's relationship and the fact that Faulkner would sign his notes home with a "love, billy".

[Alison · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked the concept, and some of the discussions of correspondence were very engaging, but it was hard to read straight through. Probably more enjoyable as a series of short stories, where you pick and choose or skip around and read what interests you.

[The Book Studio]

Watch Bethanne Patrick interview Thomas Mallon about his new book Yours Ever: People and Their Letters on The Book Studio.

[Allyson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed reading this book and discovered facts about authors/writers previously unknown to me. It strikes me as the type of book benefitting from rereads as well. The cover itself is intriguing and what lies between the pages proves to be even more so.
Thoroughly enjoyable.

[Maureen · Rating 2 out of 5]

not what i was expecting... thought it would be actual letters grouped by theme (absence, friendship, advice, complaint, love, spirit, confession, war, prison) with short intro's by editor but there were no actual letters in their entirety.

[Ellen]

Ooh look, a little something for my inner Luddite.

[Dawn · Rating 5 out of 5]

So sad I had to return this before my trip. Lovely book, and I plan to check it out again.

[~mad]

Yet another book