RE-POST FROM MARCH 2024. Worth repeating:
Kurt Vonnegut (1922- 2007) was a famous American author who was living in New York City when he received a letter from some high school students whose teacher wanted them to write some famous authors for advice about life.
Vonnegut, the novelist who wrote Slaughterhouse-Five, was the only one who responded. He was elderly, and his answer, written on his letterhead , provided useful advice.
Below is the letter copied by me since the original is hard to decipher. Pass it on to some kids who need valuable guidance as they seek “becoming” and experience a “growing soul.” He signs with a caricature of his face.
Dear Xavier High School and Ms.Lockwood and Messrs Perin, McFeely, Batten, Maurer and Congiusta:
I thank you for your friendly letters. You sure know how to cheer up a really old geezer (84) in his sunset years. I don’t make public appearances any more because I now resemble nothing so much as an iguana.
What I had to say to you, moreover , would not take long, to wit: Practice any art, music, singing, dancing, acting, drawing, painting, photography, sculpting, poetry, fiction, essays, reportage, no matter how well or badly, not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what’s inside you, to make your soul grow.
Seriously! I mean starting right now, do art and do it for the rest of your lives. Draw a funny or nice picture of Ms. Lockwood, and give it to her. Dance home after school, and sing in the shower and on and on. Make a face in your mashed potatoes. Pretend you’re Count Dracula.
Here’s an assignment for tonight, and I hope Ms. Lockwood will flunk you if you don’t do it: Write a six line poem, about anything, but rhymed. No fair tennis without a net Make it as good as you possibly can. But don’t tell anybody what you’re doing. Don’t show it or recite it to anybody, not even your girlfriend or parents or whatever, or Ms. Lockwood. OK?
Tear it up into teeny-weeny pieces, and discard them into widely separated trash receptacles. You will find that you have already been gloriously rewarded for your poem. You have experienced becoming, learned a lot more about what’s inside you, and you have made your soul grow.
God bless you all!
Kurt Vonnegut
* Letter obtained for Blogfinger by Stephen Goldfinger from REDDIT (Internet site)
SIMON AND GARFUNKEL: