by H. G. Adler
Once your own addresses have been exhausted, you call up someone and say that you have some free time and would like to write the friends of their relatives and friends. This way, you get new addresses and are also asked to give freely of your own stock of them. This way you can build a treasure trove of addresses, and a good number of people are known for possessing loads of addresses. No one would admit this openly, for in contrast to the vanity that attaches itself to anyone with money who accumulates valuable things, in this case each is silent about his riches, at best alluding to it only by saying, “I’m busy, I still have many friends to write.”
The advantage of having many addresses is obvious. You do not lose hold of those that you must write to, and it pleases you the more that your collection of addresses grows, providing you with the revitalized prospect of increasing the number of your friends. This explains the popularity of the saying that one finds in many family albums: “The friends of my neighbors are also friends of mine.”
You feel good about your contacts, but no letter writer has ever received an answer back. If you abruptly ask one of them, he will behave like someone resting quietly in a church, but who has been disturbed by the suddenly loud babbling of a child, causing him to whisper excitedly with glazed eyes, “No, I haven’t gotten any answer yet. But that doesn’t matter, as long as there’s still hope. One must be patient and can always wait.” Perhaps he will then add, “It might be that I’ll get a number of letters at once and from a number of friends.”
Who came up with the convention of writing letters is unknown. The custom is very old. Some who think they know say that it goes back no further than the monks in Irish cloisters or in St. Gallen, but that is not correct. Others look back to ancient Greece, but whoever looks back more knowledgeably follows clues that lead to ancient Egypt and Ur. Lovers of the East also point to China and Tibet. The truth does not support their views. Though not as authentic as legends normally are, still attractive is the ancient legend of Adam as the inventor of the letter, and no history of the letter can ignore this possible source.
As the first person who heard the Lord’s edict not to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and yet who in foolish arrogance did so anyway, Adam heard a voice that said, “Where are you?” Adam, who before eating the apple was innocent and knew neither fear nor cunning, was now afraid and tried to hide. Never before did the Lord have to ask where he was, and it was also known that eating the fruit was a light offense in comparison with hiding from the Lord, who strolled in the Garden, it being the first unforgivable sin handed down from generation to generation, and thus the original sin. Harsh was the penalty for the awareness that brought death to Adam, but such awareness was given to human beings, they knowing good and evil to this very day, but harder yet was the penalty for hiding, because for that he was expelled from Paradise.
When Adam cultivated the earth from which he had been formed, he was sad, and Eve, full of sympathy, tried to take care of him. Adam said, “Do you see the cherubim with their flat hewn swords defending the path to the Tree of Life from us? Know that I love and desire life, but the Lord has said that I am dust and must return to dust.” Eve knew what to tell him: “Go and make a sign to the Lord, so that he may know our wish and hear it.” Then Adam broke off a stone from a cliff and struck it and chiseled a sign of his wish into it. Through the sweat of his brow he earned from above the gift of writing, which in the midst of his need he thought to have invented himself. Adam showed Eve the stone, she praised him, and Adam tossed it in the direction of where the cherubim stood. Adam was blinded by the brilliance of their eyes and the points of their swords, such that he could not see where the stone fell upon the ground. There was also such a whirring in the air that he did not hear when the stone reached its target.
Adam was again sad, and again Eve spoke to him: “You do not know what happened to the stone. Fear not, chisel a new stone, write down on it a sign of our wish and throw it again.” Adam did as Eve asked of him. He did it more and more, and he continued to do it whenever his sorrow consumed him upon the field. Thus did Adam, according to the legend, invent the letter, and the first letter was a wish tossed toward the Paradise that had been lost.
Not everyone believes the ancient stories, which are taken as late attempts to grant the most important inventions of the human race handed down from antiquity a mythic aspect, rather than to content onself with more prosaic, alleged explanations that are nonetheless much closer to the truth. In any case, what is certain is only that the custom of writing letters is handed down from parents to children. In many families, the offspring are introduced to it at a very tender age; hardly have the children learned to write than the parents insist that the youngsters write a little letter every day. At first, mother dictates it; later, they suggest what one can write, while the father corrects errors and worries about the address, until, after a few years, the children take letter writing to be a necessity.
As people grow, at some point they experience a severe crisis, most usually between twenty and twenty-five. Rarely does this lead to a renunciation of writing, though sometimes it lasts for some time, and is then quietly taken up again. More often it occurs that young people assume that an address is too old or, sadly, they think that a friend has died long ago. Then they mark the address with a cross and lay it to the side. If their conscience bothers them later, they erase the crosses with a good deal of effort and write to such addresses in an especially heartfelt and tender manner. Whoever overcomes such temptations or never succumbs to them will have nothing to do with such matters and says, “You shouldn’t do that. Who wants to see his friend in the grave?” This corresponded to the widespread belief that your friends have not died, have gained power and influence with age, or have produced able-bodied progeny who are full of joy over the devotion to one’s ancestors which letters manifest. There are also cranks, most of them ancient, who are known as collectors of old addresses. They usually direct their letters only to addresses that are more, or at least somewhat more, authentic.
It is assumed that an original response will be received; otherwise, this practice would not have survived or spread significantly. One cannot know today for certain, yet we know a great deal, often from very old legends that provide impressive evidence of replies having been received. One can foresee from these stories the wisdom that our forefathers spoke, thus providing reports of responses found here and there, though always only as rumors. If you looked at them more closely, you’d be shocked by the degree of stupidity and irresponsible nonsense that is generally dispersed, not as a swindle that people grant credibility but as exaggerated gossip that quickly rings hollow the moment you scrutinize it. At best, you find traces of a family tradition that says a grandfather once received a response, but which he showed to no one, though from that moment on he was supposedly happy. Sometimes such news surges through city and country in wild eddies and sets everything to reeling such that it hardly abates, for it’s fed with fresh material full of fantasies that frequently causes gullible people to turn such matters into fabrications.
From whom should the responses come? In serious circles, it is surmised that among the trove of still current addresses the overwhelming majority of the names are made up or invented; even where the names may, in fact, be actual, the town, street, and house numbers are in large part false. Some people are not afraid to admit such shortcomings, but they don’t put too much stock in them, and explain that those addressed in any case live way beyond the border in a foreign land, a reliable map of which no one owns, though it’s not necessary as long as the post forwards the letters. The main thing is that they reach those countries in which great care is taken to make proper deliveries, and the recipient is found or inquires himself. It’s hard to battle against this belief; whoever doubts the truth stays silent and guards against the enmity of the streets. In addition, most keep quiet about their doubts when they begin to think about the worth of their own addresses. Hardly anyone
gives up on his own, but almost everyone keeps using them, despite any ideas to the contrary, saying, “We humans, what can we know? We can’t just give up.”
Commonly, the telephone is used to gather addresses, even though it is hardly ever used for personal matters, whether in business or socially. This is somewhat surprising, since it was not so long ago that the telephone didn’t exist. How such exchanges occurred then is unknown. Letter writing is indeed very old, and yet so little is known about its most recent history! The most likely version says that letter writers used to secretly seek one another out, whereby you would take a guest into an adjoining room and relay addresses back and forth through the closed door. Outwardly, this approach was supported by the letter writer’s penchant for stowing away secrets, while a much more esoteric lesson can be seen in this secret exchange. It’s said that the use of two separate rooms, between which a wall runs as a result of the closed doors, is modeled on an ancient ritual that invokes the desired exchange of letters across borders. However that may be, we cannot know for sure; one can investigate only those customs that are common practice today.
If you share your addresses on the telephone, a stream of fervent thank-yous follows. You are assured that you have done someone a great service, while it’s also strenuously emphasized what pleasure is accorded the one who gives out such information, since now you will have helped get more news to your friends. This is according to the custom of announcing the intermediary when writing to a new address in order to praise the one who helped and thereby enhance his reputation with the recipient. Whoever is always eager to accumulate new addresses—and that goes for the majority of letter writers—is called a street writer by those who are against this practice. With this insult, the unappeasable address hunters are branded, and are thought of as fickle people, lacking in conviction and reliability.
Different are the noble writers, who claim that only a few people, and at best only one, should write to his personal friends, in order not to confuse them and not to seem insistent. Some of them argue that one should write only rarely, for only then is the recipient overjoyed to receive a letter, and that, indeed, one should share meager though solid news, if only to awaken someone’s curiosity, and yet not bother those who are very busy. The adherents of this conviction attempt to make themselves into beloved ones who, as a result, hope to receive a response.
The belief in a best friend, or what many consider to be the same, a best address, is shared by a group that proudly calls itself single-letter writers. They excitedly advocate that there is only one address of any real worth, while the rest are, if not in fact unused, only meaningless. Unfortunately, among the single-letter writers there is no agreement as to what the right address is. Each individual adherent thinks he knows, yet not one can substantiate the truth of his claim. That turns this group, valued as it nonetheless may be, into agitators and cranks who rarely agree on anything and most often fall prey to suspicion. Only a certain shyness holds back the single-letter writers from breaking out into open battle, but with other letter writers they share the tendency to talk about the virtues of this or that address over the phone. One invokes the beauty of a name or different unusual aspects, such as the sound, the number of letters, wanting to constantly discern or discover from its sequence or shape a rhythmic charm. Endlessly the question is posed, “So, then, do I have the best address?,” until someone complains about how much valuable time, which would be better used for writing, is idly being wasted through such talk. At which the other most often agrees, happy not to have to defend his hard-to-support rationale. Others avoid completely such pointless exchanges, though their own thoughts are occupied a great deal by this question.
Rarely will someone admit that he does not give out his best address, for this risks the possibility that he would not get any help from others. It can also happen, though rarely, that he turns down all inquiries. If he will respond only when someone visits in person, he is then called, with good-natured kidding, a whisperer, though it quickly gets around that there is nothing at all to learn from him, he being considered with a mixture of astonished shyness and indignation and called a lone writer.
Infrequent are those old fogies who spring up here and there like a weed and quickly explain in short order that they don’t care about addresses, they are not at all interested in this scribbling, and want only not to be bothered with any of this. In this case there is no point in trying, for these heretics say nothing. What remains unknown is whether they still write letters secretly and, out of shame, arrogance, or eccentricity, don’t say anything about it. Some questions are posed to the heretics: Do you not take part because you don’t want any friends? Do you think writing is pointless because you don’t get any response and can never expect to get one? Do you think there’s a better way to keep in touch with your friends? But the answer remains unknown.
Some heretics are quiet and go their own way without bothering about the letter writers. Among them are nice people who don’t want any enemies. Others are those—it’s not easy to discover them, but nonetheless one senses their presence—who laugh at the letter writers, declaring with mockery that it is superstition and saying that foolish people should make themselves useful, and at least concern themselves with more everyday things than such a pack of received notions that only advance the ridiculous from generation to generation, all of it a barrier to any reasonable explanation. They maintain that a courageous government would ban such nonsense and penalize it. The letter writers feud with and hate these troublemakers, knowing that they enjoy the complete and full protection of the state, though they also fear the evildoers, for the hooligans among them threaten that one day they will raid a mailbox in order to search for the letters and expose this outrageous scam and shameful madness in a pamphlet in order to shine the hard light of day upon it. Yet none had risked doing so, for they were afraid of the law, which threatens the violation of the privacy of letters with harsh penalties. They also want to guard for certain against any such future action, and so all such mockery remains nothing more than a lot of hot wind that reveals its own powerlessness and only scares itself.
One would be pleased to know what happens with the countless letters through which the state pulls in millions each day owing to the high postal rates. What is not known is where the letters end up; only the postal administration could solve this puzzle, but not even the boldest of heretics is willing to question that, and the trust in the honest work of the post office is boundless. The fact is that the number of mailbox pickups has continually increased in recent years; writing is increasing at all social levels, and the colder it gets. Only in the summers, which grow shorter each year, does this passion decrease a bit, but hardly does autumn arrive than it increases with multiplied fervor. Statistics about the number of letters mailed are not published. Conservative estimates indicate astronomical figures, and reliable experts on the economy assure us that a significant part of people’s means is dedicated to writing supplies and stamps, which for the welfare of the lower classes is critical. Even letter writers on the highest of levels who understand such things fear bad consequences as a result.
Through polls conducted to find out the general opinion of society, it recently and surprisingly came to light that today there are many letter writers who never use the telephone to help search for addresses, and that their number is increasing. Some people don’t have a telephone and yet still want to write letters. It indeed has not escaped anyone’s attention that there could be many reasons that people decline being connected to such a network, but it is assumed that these people are satisfied with their own addresses or they use a stranger’s telephone. But not everyone wishes to disturb his neighbor or to hurry across the street to an unpleasant phone booth. Others don’t like the phone itself, and find it to be soulless, or worry that the operator can overhear them, or avoid the loss of irretrievable time through long phone conversations. Others more mature with years decide, even when they have their own telephone,
that they have now collected enough addresses, enough is enough, and thereby they write one letter after another with deeper devotion to those friends they already have. Often, they admonish the young, “Why do you keep writing letters to new recipients and thereby continually increase your troubles? Fewer is wiser. Too much writing results in a flighty and superficial nature. I’m telling you that to be frugal in the number of letters you write is a virtue. Only then can you really succeed in best serving the work itself and compose letters that contain in-depth accounts.”
As one can imagine, the letters differ in appearance in both content and form. From very short ones composed of halting words written in the style of telegrams—often barely the length of a line—to endless sentences that resemble serial novels in their length, you find all levels in between. Many writers reflect their innate or acquired artfulness, many dissemble and write in a consciously different manner than their nature dictates, turning grandiose phrases while sharing everyday events, or formulate tracts marching out in paragraphs like laws or mathematical or chemical formulas, while still others compose tiresome poems with heavy measures that resemble the language of sacred texts, or employ a philosophical diction that demonstrates their learning, their inherent sophistication, their righteousness, their pious nature, though, on the other hand, some formulate a strange and dead language, especially when they supplement this style through dictionaries and grammar, inventing their own language and constructing a secret code whose key is hard to find, also adding drawings and marvelous little pictures, attaching notes or enclosing them separately. They choose small and large formats, they use different inks and pens, having their own letter cases and small hand presses at home, as well as embossing machines for normal print and for Braille. They don’t use just paper but also bast, vellum, birch bark, silk, thin sheets of metal, and many other materials. Some use a stamped envelope with a return address and even include an empty sheet of paper for the convenience of the recipient, on which there is often a prepared response that the friend would have only to sign and return. What the content of the letters is can never be told. Both the general and the personal in lively exchange, sketches of nature or worries about love, homespun accounts and troubling questions, reprimands and confessions, requests and recommendations, familiar gossip and memory-laden reminiscences, essays on the everyday, trusted secrets, weather reports, business worries, announcements of happy or sad events, memories, nonsense, recipes, jokes, warm conversation, deep-seated fantasies—all of it makes up a vast and varied assortment.