Shakespeare, Lord Byron, Elizabeth Browning, Pearl Buck, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ernest Hemingway, and Maya Angelou are some of our beloved men and women of letters. A “Man of Letters” is primarily concerned with literary and scholarly arts, the beauty of the written word and the value of humanism.
The concept of Humanism relates not just to the study of Humanities, but relates to any system or way in thought or action in which human interests, values and dignity predominate in philosophy or behavior.
Aha! Now you know why an Empathy Queen is interested!
Beyond all the brilliance in hand-written journals and diaries that capture our history and imagination, from Anne Frank to slavery, is the ability to capture great thought in the written word. Beautiful and eloquent thoughts have been shared in one’s own handwriting.
What a loss to realize that our children cannot read these works in their original form!
My heartfelt note and birthday wishes could not be read by my teenage recipient and that is when I realized how we have cheated this generation by giving up on Cursive writing. It is no longer taught in schools or part of educational curriculum. Spelling and grammar are not understood, nor appreciated, as they can be electronically corrected.
How can we transmit all of our history in handwritten love letters and documents of citizenship? Letters home have been a tradition of summer camp and kept as treasures, now relegated to relics of the last century. Papers and letters, censored or delivered in war torn areas by Red Cross delegations, speak of our greatest fears, loves, desires, horrors and history. Elie Wiesel wrote “Night” as his diary to remind us of what should never happen again. Ship manifests and hand-written applications filled Ellis Island to bring our descendants to America and record their personal effects, family members and birthdays. The Declaration of Independence and the signatures of our Founding Fathers cannot be read by our children.
Our humanity is in our hands and the way we brushstroke the letters of our signatures. Graphology provides us with clues to a writer’s character and personality when we can study the actual handwriting of an individual.
The beauty of linguistics and communication, a heartfelt note, a treasured thank you, Grandma’s well-kept recipes are part of our individual and family histories. The lost art of reading and writing cursive limits the notions of beauty and loyalty we can share and appreciate with our children.
Our signatures are bold, notable, remarkable and a lasting imprint; but only if we can read them.
http://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_writing_challenge/a-lost-art/
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Thank you for stopping by! It means more than you know.
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theempathyqueen 