Letters By Napoleon, Churchill, Beethoven found in Swiss Laundry

[Cousin Hepcat]

How cool would it have been the one to make *this* discovery:

By REUTERS
Published: June 4, 2007
Filed at 11:59 a.m. ET

LONDON (Reuters) - One of the word's greatest collections of historical letters, including a note written by Napoleon to his lover Josephine, has been found in a filing cabinet tucked away in a Swiss laundry room.

The treasure trove of almost 1,000 documents, collected over 30 years by a wealthy Austrian banker, includes letters written by Winston Churchill, Peter the Great, Mahatma Gandhi, Alexander Pushkin, John Donne and Queen Elizabeth I.

One of the rarest and most touching of the collection is a passionate letter written by an apologetic Napoleon to his wife to be, Josephine, the morning after a furious argument.

"I send you three kisses -- one on your heart, one on your mouth and one on your eyes," wrote the chastened lover in a spidery scrawl full of corrections and crossings out.

The letters, which cover more than 500 years and range across art, science, literature and philosophy, are to be auctioned by Christie's in London on July 3 and are expected to raise up to 2.3 million pounds ($4.6 million).

"It really is an incredibly dense, very carefully researched collection," Thomas Venning, director in Christie's books department and a specialist in signed letters, told Reuters.

"To get a collection of letters like this nowadays is really a one-off, it's almost unheard of."

The owner, Albin Schram, began amassing the archive in the early 1970s, steadily building up one of the largest and most comprehensive collections outside a major museum.

Though an inveterate collector, Schram wasn't interested in conservation or display -- the letters were kept in an old metal cabinet in the laundry room of his villa in Lausanne, Switzerland, ordered by size rather than author or date.

When he died in 2005, his family barely knew they were there.

Schram's interests spanned Russian poets, Argentine authors, French philosophers, English politicians and Italian sculptors.

One of the most prized lots, with an auction estimate of up to 120,000 pounds, is a note written by metaphysical poet John Donne to Lady Kingsmill a day after the death of her husband in October 1624.

Urging her not to presume to contest God's actions, Donne, who was dean of St Paul's Cathedral at the time, adds: "although we could direct him to do them better."

"It's an incredibly moving letter to read," said Venning.

"This is one of Britain's greatest poets, a contemporary of Shakespeare, writing at a very emotional time... Not only that, but it's exceptionally rare -- there is perhaps only one other John Donne letter in private hands."

Another lot of interest is a letter written by Ernest Hemingway to the American poet and critic Ezra Pound in 1925, explaining why bulls are better than literary critics.

"Bulls don't run reviews. Bulls of 25 don't marry old women of 55 and expect to be invited to dinner. Bulls do not get you cited as co-respondent in Society divorce trials. Bulls don't borrow money. Bulls are edible after they have been killed."

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-britain-letters.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

 

[Cousin Hepcat]

account from another source



Susannah Morris was called in to examine the hoard after the death of the secretive collector and was astonished to be led not into a library or a safe room but to the basement.

In the laundry room, wedged between a washing machine and a tumble dryer, was a plain metal filing cabinet. Miss Morris, who works for the auction house Christie's, opened it and could not believe her eyes.

Inside was the most remarkable collection of letters she had seen outside a national institution: a love letter by Napoleon; a diplomatic note to the king of France in the hand of Elizabeth I; a letter of condolence by John Donne; a tragic account written in 1545 by John Calvin, the theologian of the Reformation, about the suicide of a friend; and a withering letter by Charlotte Brontë on male shortcomings.

As Miss Morris delved through files, where the papers were arranged by size rather than alphabet, date or subject, her eyes grew wider.

There was a letter by Beethoven, one by Albert Einstein, by Isaac Newton, Hemingway, Frederick the Great, Darwin, Voltaire, Lewis Carroll, Pushkin, Monet, Churchill, Gandhi, Defoe, Tchaikovsky and Dostoevsky.

By the time she had finished her first trawl she had counted almost 1,000 letters written by the great monarchs, scientists, authors, painters, philosophers and musicians from the 15th to the 20th century in almost every European language.

After months of research Miss Morris has valued the find, which is to be sold in separate lots at Christie's in London on July 3, at £2 million.

She said yesterday: "It was an extraordinary find in such an improbable place. It is a history in miniature of the last 500 years of western civilisation and is the most remarkable collection on the market for a generation or more."

The man who spent half a lifetime putting it together was Albin Schram, who died two years ago. The son of an Austrian industrialist, he was born in Prague 1926.

 

[happyfilmluvguy]

Interesting. I wouldn't mind reading more of the letter. Exerts aren't enough. They don't mention the translators, though. Thanks for the article.