Postscript: Life, Love and Loss in Australian Letters #author The National Library of Australia

The National Library of Australia holds millions of letters in its collections: love letters, reports on scientific discoveries, impassioned pleas, newsy notes about the week that's just been, responses from politicians to members of the electorate, letters to the editor and so many more.

We've made a selection of remarkable letters from those millions, and passed them on to modern Australians to write new letters, inspired by those from our collection.

The original letters may have shaped history, confessed love, covered philosophical matters like aging or creativity, or given an insight into the writers' lives. The modern letters do the same. By turns moving, funny and challenging, this is a collection of letters that will engage and enlarge readers' sense of empathy and may inspire them to pick up the pen themselves. This book is a testament to the particular power of a letter (or an email, fax or telegram) to shock us, to move us and to warm us.

Authors include:

Jane Austen
John Barrett
Barbara Blackman
Frank Bongiorno
Neville Bonner
David Brooks
Norma Brooks
Reverend John Flynn
Kate Forsyth
Mem Fox
Bill Gammage
Morris Gleitzman
Patrick Glynn
Daniel Gray-Barnett
Henry Lawson
Maggie Mackellar
Reverend William McLeod
Sir John Monash
Adela Pankhurst
Raelene Rallah-Baker
Frank Reid
Amy Remeikis
Sita Sargeant
Robert Skinner
Barrina South
Dr Ranjana Srivastava
Kylie Tennant
John Trigg
Sam Wallman
Shelley Ware
John Ian Wing
Michael Winkler
Judith Wright

To connect with NLA Publishing ...
https://www.library.gov.au/discover/nla-publishing 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

It's good morning, Lauren Smith. Welcome to Yellow Shelf. Hi, thanks for having me. Oh, it's my pleasure. Congratulations. I have the most delightful book, which I'm going to hold up correctly, Postscript. Lauren, I'm just going to start off by saying I read it and then I wanted to read it again. So tell us all about this fabulous, quaint book.

SPEAKER_01 0:22

Oh, very kind. So we uh the National Library of Australia, we have a small publishing program and we focus on sharing our collection, and that is where this book began. So we have millions of letters in our collection from some famous Australians, some regular Australians, uh, all different types of people, some non-Australians. Um, and I love those letters. I've gotten a chance to read a lot of them as we've worked on other books, and those letters have always stopped me because of their humanness, their honesty and their hope and their passion and their fears. And when one person writes to another person, you know, it's unrehearsed, it might be prepared, they might have thought about their words, but it's rich and it's full and it has, you know, all of this weight. And I wanted a way to share that with people. So we have published a volume of those letters basically, um, and paired them with new letters from modern Australians who were inspired by the originals. So I wanted to also show how powerful the collection is to inspire everyone, not just academics, family researchers, family historians, but anyone can come in and they can call up Judith Wright's letters and they can have a read and they can think about how it might shape their own life.

SPEAKER_00 1:27

And Lauren, it's delightful, the older the new, uh, that feeling of emotional energy through written connection. Yeah, it's really beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 1:37

You can see kind of this web of connection. You know, we have a couple of examples in there. We have Judith Wright Wright or Blackman writing to Judith Wright. So you see this web that existed, but it also exists today. People are still in communication with people that they know and love in their family, the people that they admire. Everyone's still writing to their favorite authors. They're finding a way to communicate and speak to them, uh, to people who mean something to them, as well as, you know, our business like letters, our letters to politicians. All of this is charged communication often and often quite private. And there's something really meaningful about taking that peek behind the scenes.

SPEAKER_00 2:11

Yeah. And Lauren, I'm gonna, you know, just self-indulge here. So I had a I had a favourite, and and the reason I had it as a favourite is it's the the Mem Fox and the Morris Flutzman. I guess, you know, I grew up reading Mem Fox. I have children who read Morris books, you know, so I think there were so many, there's so many wonderful uh connections in here, but that was my favorite, so I'm gonna tease tease anyone listening or watching that they need to go and check that one out as my favorite. I probably shouldn't ask this. Do you have a favorite? Is there something special in the book that you want to mention?

SPEAKER_01 2:49

Uh that is it's very much choosing a favorite child at this point. Um I have loved them all in different ways, and and that includes the originals that we were finding in the collection and being really moved by, as well as the new ones. When when our contributors were writing these brand new letters and sending them in, I would be bursting into tears, you know, looking at my inbox. And so um, I have a lot of favourites. Probably the one that I think about the most is the one that opens the book, the letter from John Flynn to his father. Um, he wasn't yet the reverend John Flynn, he had not done any of the things that he's now famous for. He was just a 29-year-old man writing to his dad to thank him for how he raised him and to try and to try and pledge to to you know live a life that's worthy of the way his father had. And that's so that's heartbreaking and beautiful. And of course he did. Yes, he he he did exactly what he promised. So um, that was the first letter that I knew would go into this collection.

SPEAKER_00 3:41

Yeah, wonderful. And Lauren, do you want to tell us about the journey, the inspiration, like in your job to put this together? Like, I I I want I'd love you to share with the audience, yeah, what what that was all about.

SPEAKER_01 3:55

Well, I started here at the library five years ago as the publisher, and one of my first questions, my job is to share the collection with readers. And my question was, how do I get into the collection? Like, how do I? We've got 10 million items or you know, collection things of uh about Australians and uh Australia. Uh, how do I know what's in there? Um and I have worked on that and I have access, right? I can follow other people in, I work with people whose job it is to know and study that collection, and I have the time, I can go up, I can call something up, I can go straight up to the room, and I can look at, like I did for this project, letters from Florence Nightingale to Australian nurses, and I can look at um you know all kinds of things. Um and I realized I I take so much joy in that. There's such a privilege in having that close access, but I don't have that access because I work here. All of us have that access. Any person can come in, get our library cards, and they can call up John Flynn's letters, Judith Wright's letters, uh, David Brooks' manuscript collection, Kylie Tennant's letters, Patrick White's letters, which miraculously exist. Um, everyone can do that. And I that's one of the things I really wanted to show with this book because it is it's a huge privilege, but it is also there for anybody. Um, and I wanted to show that a bit with this book.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

Well, you it's very clever, it's thoroughly enjoyable. Uh at times it's incredibly emotional. Um, Lauren, do you want to share with us anything about the book? Um, any any short snippets, anything you'd like to uh Well, I might read the John Flynn letter, which is short.

SPEAKER_01 5:22

He spent an hour doing writing this, an hour writing 261 words. So you know he was he was thinking about it as he wrote this is the letter that he wrote to his father. It's very emotional, but you know, we're coming into Mother's Day, it's the right time to be thinking emotional thoughts about our parents. Yes. Um, so this is from the 24th of November 1910. Um Dear Father, I just now wakened to the fact that tomorrow is the 25th, and so I have only another hour this side of 30. Don't know that there is any special significance in that fact. Certainly it feels much like any other hour. But before sliding into the years to bring greater responsibilities and wider life generally, it would be well for me to turn and thank you for the love and ease of the long years now behind. There seems to be a deal of the unspeakable scot in us at times, I fear. The absence of a mother's touch has perhaps intensified the fault. So let me take this opportunity of heartily thanking you for your pains and sacrifices on our behalf. As to the future, God only knows what it holds in store for us. My going to the bush must seem to you inconsiderate, and I shrink from it terribly at times. But somehow I have stumbled into things as deep as they are, and I dare not turn back. But wherever I move, I will try and merit that respect which your name has won among all who know you. If I can carry into the church that citizenship which you have always displayed, even amid most depressing circumstances at times, I will not have lived in vain. That hour is now more than up. So let me open a new decade with the wish that I may prove in it worthy of you and of the cause I seek to serve. Your affectionate son, John.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

What so considered, such a considered written letter.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

Yeah, and just I think of the 29-year-old you know, men I know, um 29-year-old women I know, and and that we do want to thank our parents by that point. You do want to kind of acknowledge what they did for you. And so I think that's really beautiful and universal and um it's really stirring, I think.

SPEAKER_00 7:12

Yeah, yeah. That that letter, so many of the other letters in the book are just such a delightful read. Lauren, if we're curious, we're listening anywhere around the world, because this is like letters that just I get to inspire. So it's not just Australia. I think there's wonderful learnings in this and and a thoroughly enjoyable read. Point us in the direction of how we connect to the book and connect to the National Library, you, whoever.

SPEAKER_01 7:42

Library.gov.au. For anything to do with the library, you can go through the catalogue there. There's a lot of materials been digitized. You do not even need a library card. You are welcome just to have a look online. Just type something you're interested in into the catalogue search bar. Uh, you can buy the book uh from all good bookshops. The library bookshop has it and can sell it. And there is an e-book coming for some of our international people who just want it as quick as possible and prefer to read digitally.

SPEAKER_00 8:04

Yeah, wonderful. Well, Lauren, uh, thank you so much. This has you read it again, and I feel like I'm just gonna leave it on my coffee table and read it again and again. Um, will there be more of these? Like that's what I was left thinking. Is this because I'm sure, like you started by saying, there's countless letters.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

There is there's an endless number of letters. I would really love to make more volumes. I'm just waiting to see how the readers respond. Sure. Um, yeah, and uh if there's interest, I would love to kind of run a volume every year or two. I think we certainly have enough letters uh and there's enough aspects of human life to cover.

SPEAKER_00 8:39

So Well, there's our call to action. We need an audience here to dive in and read. Lauren, thank you so much for joining us. All the best. Bye. Cheers.