The Letter Exchange - Links Related to Issue 13

	THE LETTER EXCHANGE
	Connecting Penfriends Since 1982

Links related to Issue 13, Summer 2007

The Letter Exchange, Summer 2007

Feathers shall raise men even as they do birds, toward heaven; that is by letters written with their quills.
— Leonardo da Vinci

Gibson People
	Charles Dana Gibson was an illustrator spanning the turn of the twentieth century, mostly remembered today for his drawings of a feminine ideal that became famous as the Gibson Girl (page 1). Less well known is the Gibson Man, although this series of drawings is sometimes credited with ending the fashion of American men copying the elaborate mustaches and full beards of the European upper class.
The Travelling Post Office
	From 1838 to 2004 British Royal Mail began the Travelling Post Office (page 8), a series of railway cars which not only transported mail, but allowed postal workers to sort the mail during the trip, saving a good deal of time. Some limited mail service by rail was restored in 2005, but for the most part the Travelling Post Office is a romantic chapter in history. The British Postal Museum & Archive has a current exhibition about the TPO, including a restored carriage, in Crewe, U.K., through October 2008. There is also a historical site which seems to be operated by a former TPO sorter. W.H. Auden's poem "Night Mail" was commissioned for a documentary film about the TPO. It had to be significantly changed from Auden's original draft to fit the music by Benjamin Britten; the rhythm of the poem parallels the rhythm of a train. The famous "Great Train Robbery" involved a TPO in 1963.
Imitating Cicero
	Like to try your hand at the Renaissance fashion of writing letters in the style of Cicero (page 9)? Many volumes of the letters of Cicero are available for study, including Volume 1 of the entire correspondence and a selection on Gutenberg. And if you really want to delve into that Renaissance practice, check out Controversies over the imitation of Cicero in the Renaissance : with translations of letters between Pietro Bembo and Gianfrancesco Pico, On imitation; and a translation of Desiderius Erasmus, the Ciceronian (Ciceronianus) – you can find it in a college library if you're not ready to own such a tome.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning in The World of Letters
	Best known for her series of poems Sonnets From the Portuguese (referring to Robert Browning's pet name for her, based on her appearance), Elizabeth Barrett Barrett (the double name is a family one) gained a reputation as a poet and literary critic, which led to the correspondence with Robert that resulted in their secret marriage (recounted in the 1930s play and film The Barretts of Wimpole Street). Generally considered the greatest British female poet, various sites contain abundant information on her life and works, including the Victorian Web and the Academy of American Poets. Project Gutenberg has the text of The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Vol. II (the book the letter printed was taken from), as well as The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, 1845-1846, Vol. 1, and Sonnets From the Portuguese, Number 28 of which refers to her correspondence with Robert ("My letters! all dead paper, mute and white! And yet they seem alive and quivering...").
	Throughout her letters Elizabeth refers frequently to her cocker spaniel, Flush. In 1933 Virginia Woolf published Flush: A Biography, a short semi-fictional novel which combines historical information on Elizabeth and her family with the same themes present in Woolf's other work. Project Gutenberg of Australia has the text.
Alice and Malice in Various Lands
	Sir John Tenniel (page 28) was a well-known illustrator for the magazine Punch when Carroll asked him to do drawings for the first Alice book. Rumors of tension between writer and artist may have been exaggerated, but the process took a significant amount of time and work (including changes after the woodcuts were made from the drawings). The resulting pictures are therefore likely to be quite close to Carroll's original conception, although he wrote in a letter that several drawings of Alice were too top-heavy. Hand-coloring enhanced some of the illustrations for later editions of the books. Lenny's Alice in Wonderland site contains a wealth of information about the Alice books, including much detail about Tenniel and his drawings; although hyperlinks in the text would make the site easier to navigate, Alice aficionados will find lots to explore here. Tenniel is also featured on The Victorian Web, on posters, and of course in books.
	The first version of Alice's tale was published, as Alice's Adventures under Ground, with illustrations by Lewis Carroll – whimsical, but rather stilted in their depiction of movement and facial expression. Project Gutenberg also has the text of both the final versions, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass.
	There is also a 1916 edition with illustrations by Gordon Robinson, including a drawing of the croquet invitation letter. Although this image at left isn't radically different than Tenniel's, most of Robinson's illustrations are, with Alice alternately seeming younger and much older, and some characters completely different in the black-and-white drawings than in the color ones.
	The text of Malice in Kulturland (page 29), a propaganda book, is available here, including the illustrations (although the text appears to have been typed in rather than scanned from the original). Mainly an anti-German book published in the early years of World War I ("'The time has come,' the Kaiser said, 'to talk of blood and wars.'"), it also manages to insult a range of other targets, including the Irish ("Beware the Ulsterman, my son."), feminists ("And there's a militant suffragette with her mouth closed. That's new, isn't it?"), and perennial targets like politicians ("...the papers pointed out that what made things worse was the horrible depravity of our political leaders."). Some libraries have the book – you can check WorldCat to find one near you.
Luke Routewalker?
	Want to see a Star Wars™ mailbox (page 31) in person? Here's a list of the cities where they are. It's not clear how long they'll stay in costume – the USPS press release says 2 weeks starting in March, but the one in Minneapolis is still there as of mid-June – perhaps they'll stay dressed as R2-D2 until they need re-painting? The Star Wars™ stamps are now available in sheets with all 15 designs. A contest was held to see which stamp was the most popular, to be issued as a single this fall. The winner is... Yoda.
Buying Stamps
As mentioned in From the Editors, there are several sources for U.S. stamps other than (within the U.S.) your local post office. One is the USPS online site. The current fees are $1 for any order within the U.S., and $6 outside (the difference being the $5 International fee we refer to in Issue 13). Stamp dealers often have sheets of various denominations from both the past and present, and if you look carefully it's sometimes possible to get them at or below face value. Some possible sources include the American Philatelic Society's dealer listings and dealer mall, the ADPS Stamp Dealers Society in the U.K., the Canadian Stamps Dealers' Association's dealer list, and others. Chances are the first two will have the best deal on U.S. stamps, though, because they're likely to have the largest inventory of older stamps not valuable enough to bring high prices. And don't forget eBay, where current stamps are often available below retail.
LEX in the news
The CTW article "Dear Friend: Why Writing Letters Still Matters" is disappearing into the here-today-gone-this-evening world of the web, but is still available in the Google cache – this one is from the Missoulian on-line site. Co-editor Lonna is quoted on the first and third pages.
Powell's Books
	Clicking on most of the books on this page will take you to Powell's, the world's largest independent bookstore. You can also use the search engine to the left. Any purchase you make by following one of these links will help support LEX – not just these items but any book or DVD in their inventory.
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