letter writing is...often a harline away from one's best writing

When not knee-deep in one of our editorial seasons, I focus a few hours each day on correspondence. Letter-writing is usually time very well spent and often a hairline away from one’s best writing.

Handwritten letters, although occasionally illegible, suggest age, mood, degrees of elegance and care. And the envelopes themselves convey fragrance, for better or worse, bringing us, olfactorily, into the rooms where the letters are written. The paper crafts, photos, dried flowers, and other enclosures would otherwise come to us as mere... See more