Overview
A lifetime of letters, collected for the first time, from the legendary musician and songwriter.
John Lennon was one of the greatest songwriters the world has ever known, creator of "Help!", "Come Together", "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", "Strawberry Fields Forever", "Imagine", and dozens more. But it was in his correspondences that he let his personality and poetry flow unguarded. Now, gathered for the first time in book form, are his letters to family, friends, strangers, and lovers from every point in his life. Funny, informative, wise, poetic, and sometimes heartbreaking, his letters illuminate a never-before-seen intimate side of the private genius.
This groundbreaking collection of almost 300 letters and postcards has been edited and annotated by Hunter Davies, whose authorized biography The Beatles (1968) was published to great acclaim. With unparalleled knowledge of Lennon and his contemporaries, Davies reads between the lines of the artist's words, contextualizing them in Lennon's life and using them to reveal the man himself.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
John Lennon (1941-1980) loved to write and draw, but he never lived to author an autobiography. This annotated collection of approximately three hundred of his letters, many of them whimsically illustrated, thus stands as the most direct view of who the famed Beatle was when he wasn't creating the songs that we still love.
The Washington Post
A massive deposit of freshly excavated notes, screeds, asides and howls, each lavishly reproduced and carefully annotated, Letters is the most intimate book ever published about Lennon. In its revelation of the man's psychology, it far surpasses all previous accounts by wives, lovers, half-siblings, ex-aides and even the best biographers. This is Lennon unfiltered and characteristically defiant, scrawling ferociously across lined paper, homemade Christmas cards, Indian novelties, fading Apple Corp. letterheads. Fans of the Beatles and Lennon, students of popular culture, armchair lovers of English and Irish wit, and anyone fascinated by the inner workings of the creative mind: All will find Davies's book essential.—James Rosen
From the Publisher
"[Davies] has done a sensitive and scrupulous job collecting and annotating Lennon's letters, and the book is beautifully designed." — Vanity Fair"A massive deposit of freshly excavated notes, screeds, asides and howls, each lavishly reproduced and carefully annotated, 'Letters' is the most intimate book ever published about Lennon. In its revelation of the man's psychology, it far surpasses all previous accounts by wives, lovers, half-siblings, ex-aides and even the best biographers." — James Rosen, The Washington Post
"... Lennon's collected letters — 285 of them, richly contextualized and handsomely presented... — make for fascinating reading." — The New York Observer
"... a must-read for Beatles fans." — Glamour
An "illuminating volume that shows a different, unguarded side of the man." — Fort Worth Star-Telegram
"Fans will lap it up." — Bloomberg
"This book makes it clear, more than ever, how lamentable it is that we lost Lennon the man." — Maclean's
"The letters offer an opportunity to see Lennon less as icon than as human being." — David Ulin, Los Angeles Times' Jacket Copy