It has been not long a go that I finished reading Jonathan Safran book “Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close” (and I recommend it to all of you) , and it took me a few days to realize what big part writing was playing in the story.
So many of the characters were in one time or another using some sort of writing to fill a gap in their lives.
There is the grandmother how as a child asked people to write her letter, the grandfather how use writing instead of talking, an old reporter who made a catalog of people, each categorieses in one word, and the grandson how documents his life in a journal and embarks on a journey after finding an envelope with one work on it.
Besides these there are other more or less common ways of communicating described in the book. A walkie-talkie , a flashlight, stones thrown on a window, a note on the window and more.
In the book, the writing may be replacing something that is missing in the characters life, it is sometime a way of communicating with the world, and sometime a way to understand it.
I was thinking why letters are so important to me. Of course there is the message and the time and effort people are putting in to them, but you can get that from an Email as well.
The answer, I have to say, is that letters are one of a kind. There is the hand writing that is unique to that person, and also the fact that they cannot be duplicated. They will not be sent in syndication to a mailing list, and no one except me has the same letter.
That is what truly makes them a work of art.
