Correspondence: Models of Letter-Writing from the Middle Ages to the Nineteenth Century

Abstract

In this new book, Roger Chartier and his associates explore the history of a cultural practice that has become common and widespread: the writing of letters. They begin by examining the invention of norms for writing letters in the Middle Ages, and the fixing of these norms in popular manuals of various kinds. They then analyse the letterwriting models developed in the ancien regimes, showing how these models were linked to court literature, on the one hand, and to the popular books distributed by pedlars, on the other. Finally, they discuss the models of letter-writing developed during the nineteenth century. The nineteenth century, they argue, was a decisive period in the history of letter-writing, partly because of the rapid rise in rates of literacy and partly due to broader social and economic transformations which increased the need for writing letters.

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