I take up my pen
Media
Part of Panorama
- Title
- I take up my pen
- Language
- English
- Year
- 1967
- Subject
- Letter writing
- Letters
- Interpersonal communication
- Written communication
- Rights
-
- Abstract
- How we write letters to friends and other people today has radically changed; and letters may soon be outmoded.
- Fulltext
- ■ How we write letters to friends and other people today has radically changed; and letters may soon be outmoded. "I TAKE UP MY PEN" “I take up my pen to write you these few lines hoping that they find you in the pink as they leave me at pre sent. These hallowed words cannot be found in any Mo del Letter-Writer, among the instructions on how to accept a luncheon invitation from a Lady of Title, but they are to be seen on a mil lion yellowing pages, on let ters tied up in faded ribbon and coming from Flanders, Gallipoli, Alamein, Burma, bringing proof of affection, of love, of, even, just being alive. The bqoks of model letters flinch at nothing — com plaints to landlords about the drains, appeals to the Pope, proposals of marriage, commiserations on assorted bereavements, from husbands to second cousins once re moved: and now, indeed, finally removed. They are particularly strong on lovers’ tiffs, on taxing a fiancee with flirtations behaviour else where, or upbraiding her for being aloof. But nowadays letter-writ ing is on the way out. Oral communication has become too easy and time, it seems, far too precious. It is not the day for those determined scribblers, Lord Byron and Lord Chesterfield. I doubt if it was ever the day for Lord Chesterfield, for a man who could write such acres of chilling advice to his son and who could find it in him to state that there is nothing so ill-bred as audible laugh ter. Poor little Chesterfield was on the receiving end of these daunting missives at an age when letters should have been a delight. At school I inflicted on my parents letters of excruciat ing boredom. We had a sys tem of awards and punish ments called Stars and Stripes. Stars were good; stripes were bad. They were totted up every week and the Panorama results put up, lor all to see, on a notice-board. But I doubt if the middleaged, or over, are going to miss letters very much. It is bitter to discover as one ages that nine out of ten letters are unwelcome. They re quire answering, they contain bills requ/iring payment, they ask advice, they tell a tale of woe, they make nuisances of themselves. Least of all will I miss what one may call the Literary Letter, the letter containing the phrase beauti ful, the language flowery, the letter seen in the mind’s eye of the writer firmly on the printed page. The decline in regular letter-writing has brought an increasingly popular replace ment — the Christmas circu lar letter, a yearly round-up of family news of which fifty or so more or less legible co pies are made and sent round. This, like a summons to a cocktail party, ‘does’ every body at one fell swoop. But, unlike cocktail parties, you are expected to remember what happened last time. One day, even these will vanish, unmourned by me. It will be all jabber-jabber-< jabber on our built-in tele phones with the person one’s speaking to appallingly avail able on a telly-screen, all glaring teeth and smiles and jaw-jaw-jaw. Or will com puters, suitably programmed, take over our letter-writing? — By Arthur Marshall, The Listener, November 1966. ®w«MJUnr 1967 45
- pages
- 44-45