The lost art of letter writing

I have been reading a lot of letters these past few weeks, letters stored in an archive. Hand-written letters, letters typed on type-writers, postcards. Some are written on airmail sheets, but often original envelopes are preserved as well, with stamps I recognize from long ago. I used to love writing and receiving letters before email took over, and would buy special edition stamps to make them look pretty. It was something nice to do.

Reading these old letters has been a fascinating aspect of my new part-time job helping the biographer of Henri Nouwen. Not only is the content often very interesting, but also it seems to me that letter-writing has qualities that email correspondence just does not. Email is fleeting and easy to dismiss, and paradoxically often very time-consuming to write. Letter writing at its best displays a range of emotions, clarity of expression, a personal connection and a critical spirit. Does the average email produce all that?

The missing middle

We have lost something in giving up on letter writing. Perhaps the process is symptomatic of the introduction of a new technology, which often has unintended consequences, but that hardly makes it any less of a loss. I expressed some of my early faith experiences in letters. One lasting friendship developed through correspondence chess. Some of the best and most needed feedback I ever received came in the form of letters. And some letters I wrote I should never have posted; the sadness, or compunction – to use a beautiful Christian word – stays with me.

In the face of loss, we can lament or become angry. A lament can itself be angry – Psalm 35, for example – but have a different emphasis. I’d say that lament acknowledges a loss or a wrong but leaves the resolution to God, while the purpose of anger is action. Anger directly challenges a loss or injustice in our world. This might beg the question: are we angry enough?

People who pay attention to politicians know that there is plenty of anger to go around, in particular on the conservative side of the spectrum. Against that, liberals place only a hope and a positive spirit that seem less and less grounded in reality. What is missing is the middle: anger directed at the ugly reality of the world. We need focused anger, the type that energizes people. There must be plenty of potential but something keeps it from bursting out into the open. Is it the digital culture we live in? Inherited institutions nobody knows how to change? Deliberate confusion, distraction, misinformation? Probably some of all of these, but I cannot say for certain.

Whatever causes this lack of ‘proper’ anger, I believe that letter writing remains a good practice. Its decline can be lamented but there is no need to give up on it altogether. We can still write angry letters to the Editor, or compassionate letters to people who are suffering, or kind and generous letters (or postcards) to friends and relatives. As we move towards Advent, that seems an excellent art to practice.