A heartfelt letter written by creator John Steinbeck providing paternal recommendation to his teenage son who was experiencing love for the primary time has bought at public sale for greater than $32,000.
The two-page, handwritten letter, dated Nov. 10, 1958, went for $32,426 to a collector who needs to stay nameless, Boston-based public sale home RR Auction stated Thursday.
The letter is exceptional as a result of the Nobel Literature Prize laureate creator doesn’t merely brush off his then 14-year-old son Thomas’ emotions as infantile pet love.
“If you are in love — that’s a good thing — that’s about the best thing that can happen to anyone. Don’t let anyone make it small or light to you,” Steinbeck wrote.
He urged his son to embrace the expertise, however he warned of letdowns.
“The object of love is the best, and most beautiful. Try to live up to it,” he wrote. “If you love someone — there is no possible harm in saying so — only you must remember that some people are very shy and sometimes the saying must take that shyness into consideration.”
“Girls have a way of knowing or feeling what you feel, but they usually like to hear it also,” he stated. “It sometimes happens that what you feel is not returned for one reason or another — but that does not make your feeling less valuable and good.”
“If it is right, it happens — The main thing is not to hurry. Nothing good gets away.”
It is signed: “Love, Father.”
Steinbeck, who received a Pulitzer Prize for “The Grapes of Wrath” in 1940 and the Nobel Prize in 1962 for a physique of acclaimed work, died in 1968. Thomas Steinbeck died in 2016.
The textual content of the letter has been printed for worldwide audiences, together with in 1989’s “Steinbeck: A Life in Letters,” by Penguin Books.
Other objects bought within the Fine Autograph and Artifacts public sale included Edgar Allan Poe’s letter soliciting a donation for the Southern Literary Messenger for nearly $150,000; Benjamin Franklin’s letter deciding the destiny of the mutinous crew of John Paul Jones’ flagship for $62,500; Emily Dickinson’s poem soliciting a shopkeeper’s smile for nearly $62,000; and a Benedict Arnold signed doc certifying an oath of allegiance for a fellow officer bought for greater than $31,000.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”