Discover letters of note, past and present
What is Of Lost Time?
Welcome to Of Lost Time, a platform dedicated to bringing you the voices and stories hidden in the personal letters of people throughout history. What were people thinking, what were they worried or happy about, and more importantly what were they feeling? All of this can be found in historical letters, correspondence, and memoirs, some of the most private and intimate sources left to us in posterity.
The Letters for the Ages series
Get a glimpse into the intimate thoughts of history’s artists, scientists, athletes, philosophers, and public figures through OLT’s Letters for the Ages series. Each volume will contain an illustrated anthology of about 100 letters united by an overarching theme. Find out more about our upcoming publications: Letters for the Ages: Sport, Letters for the Ages: Behind Bars, and Letters for the Ages: Churchill, coming in 2022.
Upcoming Titles
Letters for the Ages: Sport ↗
The history of sport from the pitch to the page.
Letters for the Ages: Behind Bars ↗
What sort of messages escape through the prison bars?
Letters for the Ages: Churchill
More details to come, subscribe for the newest updates.
The Of Lost Time Blog
If you know, you know — sometimes it can be hard to make sense of historical letters without some context. Want to learn more about the who, what, when, where, and why of what past people communicated to one another?
Check out our most recent blog posts for well-researched and yet easy reads about the real, human side of history. To receive email updates, just sign up here or at the bottom of the page.
Of Lost Time is on Youtube!
Personal correspondence and letters are meant to be read, but we think that it’s important to remember these were real people by seeing and hearing them too. Our video series on Youtube features great, quirky, surprising, and insightful stories from the past, told through primary source material in a bitesize form. Subscribe and turn on notifications to see all our new videos! Here’s one we think you’ll enjoy.