Gerda

Dear Valeria,

Never stop fighting,

Gerda Taro

Kurt

Dear Valeria,

I gather from what I read in the papers and hear on television that you imagine me, and some other writers, too, as being sort of ratlike people who enjoy making money from poisoning the minds of young people. I am in fact a large, strong person, fifty-one years old, who did a lot of farm work as a boy, who is good with tools. I have raised six children, three my own and three adopted. They have all turned out well. Two of them are farmers. I am a combat infantry veteran from World War II, and hold a Purple Heart. I have earned whatever I own by hard work. I have never been arrested or sued for anything. I am so much trusted with young people and by young people that I have served on the faculties of the University of Iowa, Harvard, and the City College of New York. Every year I receive at least a dozen invitations to be commencement speaker at colleges and high schools. My books are probably more widely used in schools than those of any other living American fiction writer.

I am very real,

Kurt Vonnegut

Ursula

Dear Valeria,

What good is a literature of dissent?

This: if you don't preach to the choir, the choir won’t keep singing. We need to hear each other’s voices. A constant, urgent need. Dissent is nothing if it doesn’t speak, and speak again.

Yours truly,

Ursula K. Le Guin