Penpalling & Letters

Monday 2 April 2012

Letters... obsolete?

At present, a letter-exbition is taking place at the Spanish National Library. It was on the news a few days ago and below, you can see a video about it and a translation to English. Sadly, in the report, they refer to letters as obsolete, museum objects nowadays, and to mailboxes as those objects in danger or extinction. Do you agree about it? Do you think it is so "weird" to write handwritten letters at present times?


"Handwritten Letters Exhibition at the Spanish National Library"


Journalist (male voice):
"Dear viewers,

Today we are talking about letters, and this is why we are going to the National Library. Here we have confirmed what everybody suspects: letters are a "museum object". Writing letters is as old as the Humanity. The epistolary genre gains great importance when distance is insurmountable, physically and technologically speaking. As they have explained to us, letters are just a conversation between absent people in the end."

Gema Hernández (Spanish National Library):
"To write a letter, a situation where distance or absence exist is necessary. We are speaking about wars, emigration movements, convents and monasteries, prisons..."

Journalist (male voice):
"Right now, letters are 140 characters long. They still are a conversation between absent people. The novelty is that in many occasions those people are not only "absent" but they don't know each other. We don't know what would "Quevedo, Santa Teresa, Azorín or Valle-Inclán" -Spanish writers and poets-, present in this exhibition, say about the e-mail, "washap", Twitter and so on...
You should know, too, dear viewers, that in the streets we still can find these objects, on the verge of extinction."

Girl 1:
"And yes! To open the letterbox and find a letter from a or from someone who thinks about you is very exciting."

Girl 2:
"I hadn't written a letter for the last five years."

Man 1:
"I was a sailor and was writing to my girlfriend every day." (laughs)

Journalist (male voice):
"Love letters?"

Man 1:
"Yes, love letters. My love..."

Journalist (male voice):
"And this is the end. I hope we see each other soon!
Sincerely,
Carlos del Amor (the journalist)

And now, we put it in the mailbox. With some luck the letter will arrive tomorrow..."

1 comment:

  1. I think it is sad that alot of people actually think this is the case. In my eyes emails, facebook and phones can never take the place of a handwritten letter!!

    I will keep on writing letters always, and my daughter seems eager to write letters too! I will do my best to keep her interest in this beautiful hobby!

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