I love this, that you respond to readers. I wrote Anne McCaffrey a couple emails when I was a teen, did an English report on her as well, it was such a thrill to interact and she was very gracious with her time. Her son wrote to an author, and never got a reply, so she aimed to be better than that.
This reminds of Biddy Baxter, who wrote 2 letters to the kids TV show 'Blue Peter' and was disappointed to get the exact same reply twice.
So later she got a job on the show and created an indexing system where the thousands of kids who wrote in every week got a personalised reply every single time.
I wrote to William Campbell Gault as a young teen and got a generous response that still sits in a pile of childhood memories. Thanks for reminding me of that.
I sent an email to Susan Cooper, author of the vastly underrated The Dark Is Rising series, which saved my life as a very unhappy child.
I was moved beyond words at her reply ♥️
I truly appreciate how much of your time and effort and, well, "you" in general you dedicate to the interraction with all of us. It is very nice and kind and generous of you. Thank you so much, sir. 💙
Neil I gotta say, you interact more with your fans than any one person could reasonably be expected to do. In fact you are rather infamous on this app for your excessive accessibility. I know when you're online because my timeline is exclusively Neil Gaiman being cool, and that's honestly fantastic.
I have a page-long typed reply from John McPhee that I treasure. He ended up modifying its content for a vignette from one of his New Yorker essays.
A reply to fan mail repurposed as a first draft!
Have you considered failure offsets? Like carbon offsets , each time you do respond the positive energy generated negates the negative energy created by failing to respond. In your case it's likely that for every reply you send the energy negates at least 3 reply fails. I'll work on the math.
Man, Anne was so much of my childhood. I really liked dragons, so her stories hit me right where it counts. It's good to hear she was well-loved by her contemporaries.
I still like dragons, for what it's worth. I don't think that will ever go away.
Oh! So. When I taught yr7, one of their options for writing assignments was to write authors letters of appreciation. One of my students read a really early book of Anne McCaffery’s and got the loveliest letter back about how nice it was to hear someone still loved that story.
I worked to Anne probably 25+ years ago and wished her Happy Mothers Day. I told her how I enjoyed her work. I was not expecting an answer. Imagine my surprise the next day to see an email from her. And not from a secretary, but from her directly. Made my year!
I once wrote a Danish writer about a point in one of his books that my teacher said we should interpret a certain way. I took great pleasure in showing my teacher the reply that said my teacher hadn't understood anything.
Probably the best day of my 10 years in school 😂
Scherfig, Det Forsømte Forår
Træet i skolegården der skiftede udseende med årstiderne er med i bogen fordi det stod i hans skolegård. Det er ikke symbol på noget, iflg. forfatteren. Det mente min dansklærer det var og gjorde meget ud af at vi nævnte det 🌳
When my nephew was in prison in the oughts for what many consider victimless crimes, yours were the books I sent him every month. They were always appreciated and never confiscated.
Comments
So later she got a job on the show and created an indexing system where the thousands of kids who wrote in every week got a personalised reply every single time.
I was moved beyond words at her reply ♥️
Maybe next year.
A reply to fan mail repurposed as a first draft!
I still like dragons, for what it's worth. I don't think that will ever go away.
Don't look at the ones you fail to answer - look at the ones that you do answer. Each interaction with your readers is making someone happy :)
Probably the best day of my 10 years in school 😂
They’re too biased
Træet i skolegården der skiftede udseende med årstiderne er med i bogen fordi det stod i hans skolegård. Det er ikke symbol på noget, iflg. forfatteren. Det mente min dansklærer det var og gjorde meget ud af at vi nævnte det 🌳
You’re a good sport Neil