by erilaz » Mon Apr 04, 2022 4:01 am
^ Old letters like that can be absolutely fascinating. As I've demonstrated on this forum time and time again, I collect postal history related to Esperanto, Volapük, and similar constructed international languages, and some of the stuff that I've accumulated really opens a window to the past. I have a letter from the mid-1950s where a Swedish Esperantist is asking an American Esperantist for a copy of the famous nude Marilyn Monroe pin-up. I have a 1940 Esperanto postcard mailed from the Nazi-occupied Netherlands to Italy and stamped by the Wehrmacht censor. I have a postcard where a Russian Esperantist apologizes for his failure to write, because he ruĝarmeiĝis (became a member of the Red Army). I have a postcard from World War I where a Japanese Esperantist tells an Australian Esperantist how he wishes that Kaiser Wilhelm could be exiled to St. Helena, or better yet, to the South Pole. I have a letter from America's leading Volapükist, Charles E. Sprague, giving instructions to his printers regarding the typesetting of M. W. Wood's Dictionary of Volapük (1889). Then there are several postcards where proponents of one language or another discuss the internal politics of the international language movement. Insights into history on little pieces of paper.
"Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that." — George Carlin