Letters of the Century: America 1900-1999 - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0385315902 ISBN 13: 9780385315906

Publisher: The Dial Press, 1999

Synopsis

"Immediate and evocative, letters witness and fasten history, catching events as they happen," write Lisa Grunwald and Stephen J. Adler in their introduction to this remarkable book.  In more than 400 letters from both famous figures and ordinary citizens, Letters of the Century encapsulates the people and places, events and trends that shaped our nation during the last 100 years.

Here is Mark Twain's hilarious letter of complaint to the head of Western Union, an ecstatic letter from a young Charlie Chaplin upon receiving his first movie contract, Einstein's letter to Franklin Roosevelt warning about atomic warfare, Mark Rudd's "generation gap" letter to the president of Columbia University during the student riots of the 60s, and a letter from young Bill Gates imploring hobbyists not to share software so that innovators can make some money...

In these pages, our century's most celebrated figures become everyday people and everyday people become part of history. Here is a veteran's wrenching letter left at the Vietnam Wall, a poignant correspondence between two women trying to become mothers, a heart-breaking letter from an AIDS sufferer telling his parents how he wants to be buried, an indignant e-mail from a PC user to his on-line server...    

"Letters," write Grunwald and Adler, "give history a voice."  Arranged chronologically by decade, illustrated with over 100 photographs, Letters of the Century creates an extraordinary chronicle of our history, through the voices of the men and women who have lived its greatest moments.

About this title

Review

Letters of the Century opens by recalling a pregnant mother's letter to Jonas Salk the day after he discovered a vaccine for polio. The book's editors, veteran journalists Lisa Grunwald and Stephen J. Adler, try to describe that letter's emotional impact: "The difference between knowing that Americans were grateful to Jonas Salk and reading this letter to him is like the difference between knowing the words of a song and hearing it sung. Letters give history a voice."

Organizing them by decade, with helpful annotations for context, this couple has assembled 423 such exceptional letters, culled from a thousand times that many; each gives witness to a sliver of the century, from the bombing of Pearl Harbor to the patenting of Coca-Cola's glass bottle, from the tension of the Bay of Pigs to the flush of Internet romance. Letters to lovers, threats from gangsters, pleas to judges for mercy, tracts from terrorists, junk mail from evangelists, advice from Ann Landers, even young JFK's message carved on a coconut after PT-109 was sunk--all combine to provide one of the most authentic, resonant, and real histories imaginable, a sweeping and often intensely personal chronicle of the American 20th century, as told by the famous, the infamous, and the obscure. --Paul Hughes

About the Author

Lisa Grunwald, a freelance journalist, is a former Contributing Editor for Life magazine and former Features Editor of Esquire. She is the author of the novels New Year's Eve, The Theory of Everything, and Summer.

Stephen J. Adler is an Assistant Managing Editor at The Wall Street Journal. He is the author of The Jury: Trial And Error In The American Courtroom.

Grunwald and Adler live with their two children in New York City.

About this edition

• Publisher: The Dial Press
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0385315902
• ISBN 13: 9780385315906
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 752
• Editor: Grunwald Lisa, Adler Stephen J.