Letters Talk

This is a program sponsored by Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Indiana State University. With Sheron J. Dailey, ISU Professor Emerita & Dorothy W. Jerse, Author and Tribune-Star Columnist

Cost: Free

"Letters talk--they tell stories; they tell secrets; they shout and scold, bitch and soothe, whisper and worry, console and advise, gossip and argue, compete and compare. And along the way, they--usually without meaning to--write history." --Lisa Grunwald and Stephen J. Adler

In this day of quickly dashed off emails and even quicker texts, tweets, twitters, and even twitterature, a "real letter" that arrives in the mailbox--first class--is rare, indeed. However, in this program Dorothy and Sherry will pause for a moment to share letters of interest that were written in a less hurried time. All will recall a time when the process of writing, stamping, mailing, opening, and reading a letter was the primary way that people kept "in touch" because, as noted above, letters do talk.

Put another way, as Mary-Louise Parker stated, "Hand-written notes are a lost art. I¹m sorry, but no one ever swooned over an email."