Known to the world by the pseudonym Lewis Carroll (author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass), Charles Dodgson was a lecturer in mathematics at Oxford University from 1855 to 1881. His essay "Eight or Nine Wise Words About Letter-Writing" (1890) was originally printed in a miniature pamphlet to accompany the Wonderland Stamp-Case, which he himself had designed. Making light of this promotional venture, Dodgson wrote in the opening of the essay (not reprinted here), "Since I have possessed a 'Wonderland Stamp-Case,' life has been bright and peaceful, and I have used no other. I believe the Queen's laundress uses no other."

Eight or Nine Wise Words About Letter-Writing

by Lewis Carroll (Charles Dodgson)

I. How to Begin a Letter
If the Letter is to be in answer to another, begin by getting out that other letter and reading it through, in order to refresh your memory, as to what it is you have to answer, and as to your correspondent’s present address (otherwise you will be sending your letter to his regular address in London, though he has been careful in writing to give you his Torquay address in full).
Next, Address and Stamp the Envelope. “What! Before writing the Letter?” Most certainly. And I’ll tell you what will happen if you don’t. You will go on writing till the last moment, and, just in the middle of the last sentence, you will become aware that “time’s up!” Then comes the hurried wind-up--the wildly-scrawled signature--the hastily-fastened envelope, which comes open in the post--the address, a mere hieroglyphic--the horrible discovery that you’ve forgotten to replenish your Stamp-Case--the frantic appeal, to every one in the house, to lend you a Stamp--the headlong rush to the Post Office, arriving, hot and gasping, just after the box has closed--and finally, a week afterwards, the return of the Letter, from the Dead-Letter Office, marked “address illegible”!

Next, put your own address, in full, at the top of the note-sheet. It is an aggravating thing--I speak from bitter experience--when a friend, staying at some new address, heads his letter “Dover,” simply, assuming that you can get the rest of the address from his previous letter, which perhaps you have destroyed.

Next, put the date in full. It is another aggravating thing, when you wish, years afterwards, to arrange a series of letters, to find them dated “Feb. 17,” “Aug. 2,” without any year to guide you as to which comes first. And never, never, dear Madam (N.B. this remark is addressed to ladies only: no man would ever do such a thing), put “Wednesday,” simply, as the date!

“That way madness lies.”

II. How to Go On With a Letter
Here is a golden Rule to begin with. Write legibly. The average temper of the human race would be perceptibly sweetened, if everybody obeyed this Rule! A great deal of the bad writing in the world comes simply from writing too quickly. Of course you reply, “I do it to save time.” A very good object, no doubt: but what right have you to do it at your friend’s expense? Isn’t his time as valuable as yours? Years ago, I used to receive letters from a friend--and very interesting letters too--written in one of the most atrocious hands ever invented. It generally took me about a week to read one of his letters. I used to carry it about in my pocket, and take it out at leisure times, to puzzle over the riddles which composed it--holding it in different positions, and at different distances, till at last the meaning of some hopeless scrawl would flash upon me, when I at once wrote down the English under it; and, when several had been thus guessed, the context would help with the others, till at last the whole series of hieroglyphics was deciphered. If all one’s friends wrote like that, Life would be entirely spent in reading their letters!
This Rule applies, specially, to names of people or places--and most specially to foreign names. I got a letter once, containing some Russian names, written in the same hasty scramble in which people often write “yours sincerely.” The context, of course, didn’t help in the least: and one spelling was just as likely as another, so far as I knew: It was necessary to write and tell my friend that I couldn’t read any of them!

My second Rule is, don’t fill more than a page and a half with apologies for not having written sooner!

The best subject, to begin with, is your friend’s last letter. Write with the letter open before you. Answer his questions, and make any remarks his letter suggests. Then go on to what you want to say yourself. This arrangement is more courteous, and pleasanter for the reader, than to fill the letter with your own invaluable remarks, and then hastily answer your friend’s questions in a postscript. Your friend is much more likey to enjoy your wit, after his own anxiety for information has been satisfied.

In referring to anything your friend has said in his letter, it is best to quote the exact words, and not to give a summary of them in your words. A’s impression, of what B has said, expressed in A’s words, will never convey to B the meaning of his own words.

This is specially necessary when some point has arisen as to which the two correspondents do not quite agree. There ought to be no opening for such writing as “You are quite mistaken in thinking I said so-and-so. It was not in the least my meaning, &c., &c.,” which tends to make a correspondence last for a life-time.

Concluded on page two