Love Letters

I recently read an article in Vanity Fair about the “Romance of the Century” between Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. The article is an excerpt from a new book about the romance and marriages between the two actors.


The article touched on the already well-known facts about the two: they met on the set of Cleopatra, had an affair and were eventually married twice. But what stood out for me—even more than the large jewels that Burton frequently bestowed upon Taylor—was the fact that he wrote her love letters. She shared them with the authors of the article/book, and they quote from them extensively.

The letters are beautiful and passionate. Burton needed no special occasion to write them. In fact, he wrote one letter while Taylor was asleep in the next room. In the letter, he writes “I have decided that for a second or two, the precious potential of you in the next room is the only thing in the world worth living for.”

Reading this article made me wonder: do people even write love letters anymore? In a world of texts, emails, tweets and Facebook posts, is there room for an old fashioned love letter? I’d like to think so.

Among my most prized possessions are love letters my grandfather wrote to my grandmother. He died when I was six, and my grandmother never really talked about him. When she died, she left the letters to me, with a note asking me to treasure them as she did. I am grateful to her because these letters gave me a chance to get to know both my grandfather and the love they shared. My favorite is the one in which he wrote about a baby on the way. That baby was my mother.

According to the Vanity Fair article, Burton even wrote Taylor a letter a few hours before he died. The article stated she would not allow the authors to have a copy of that letter. Instead, she read it to them. She received it the day she arrived home from his memorial service, and it has remained in a dresser drawer next to her bed since.

That’s love.