No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline • Hacker News Board

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#21

Post by randombits0 » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 3:49 PM UTC

throwaway894345 wrote: post #11

hirundo wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it the selling of these historical artifacts that offends you, or just the fact that they have become public documents? I don't think we can categorically call it vulgar to make public the private correspondence of long dead historical figures. They can certainly help us understand those people better. So is it the fact that someone is making a profit from the transaction that you find disturbing? That doesn't bot…

The answer appears to be pretty plain in the original post: the letters are deeply personal.

No post body was provided.

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#22

Post by rurban » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 4:15 PM UTC

Not his late wife, his first wife, who died early. With his 2nd he took a miss. She was a right-wing radical McCarthyan who denounced him to the FBI as possible Russian spy. His third and late wife was finally ok then.

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#23

Post by toolz » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 4:27 PM UTC

randombits0 wrote: post #21

throwaway894345 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The answer appears to be pretty plain in the original post: the letters are deeply personal.

Quoted post unavailable.

Can you elaborate how sleeping with many women or enjoying strip clubs is related to "not equating yourself with women"?

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#24

Post by DangitBobby » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 4:47 PM UTC

gautamcgoel wrote: post #3

There is something indescribably vulgar about auctioning off a letter a man wrote to his dead wife. I am quite sure that when Feynman penned that letter he had no idea it would eventually be sold by strangers for profit.

When my grandmother died, one of her children discovered a box full of correspondence between her and my grandfather while he was in the war. They subsequently turned this collection of letters into a book and published it. I was horrified, but the rest of the family seemed to think it was a great idea. It's a real head-scratcher to me.

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#25

Post by stathibus » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 4:48 PM UTC

randombits0 wrote: post #21

throwaway894345 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The answer appears to be pretty plain in the original post: the letters are deeply personal.

Quoted post unavailable.

Fortunately Feynman is already dead and doesn't have to endure random strangers on the internet reading his personal letters or making sweeping moral judgments about his true nature based on anecdotes.

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#26

Post by throwawaycities » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 5:35 PM UTC

echelon wrote: post #20

hirundo wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it the selling of these historical artifacts that offends you, or just the fact that they have become public documents? I don't think we can categorically call it vulgar to make public the private correspondence of long dead historical figures. They can certainly help us understand those people better. So is it the fact that someone is making a profit from the transaction that you find disturbing? That doesn't bot…

Just wait until they auction off the frozen body of Ted Williams in a hundred years or so. The moral questions over private correspondence will pale in comparison. I imagine if buying dead people becomes as commonplace as buying art, some future Cards Against Humanity performative comedy outfit might try an analogously outrageous "cut up a Picasso" stunt. Which is all to say that selling love letters is relatively ta…

Look up Body Worlds. The owner has been obtaining bodies primarily from China, plasticizing them, and displaying them all over the world (primarily in the US) charging public admission for all to see.

There is significant controversy and speculation about the origin of the bodies themselves, such as being Chinese political agitators and/or originating from “camps”. Some “returned” bodies clearly died of head trauma, others of bullet wounds. Two doctors in Russia were charged with supplying 56 bodies without consent that included homeless and mentally ill.

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#27

Post by option_greek » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 5:41 PM UTC

randombits0 wrote: post #21

throwaway894345 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The answer appears to be pretty plain in the original post: the letters are deeply personal.

Quoted post unavailable.

And that makes it okay to make private communication public?

Isn't it hypocrisy to argue to for privacy of the living (HN being pro privacy) but not of the dead.

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#28

Post by mynameisash » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 6:14 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #15

gigatexal wrote: post #5

Quoted post unavailable.

I think that was after his first wife died. I do wonder to what extent his later somewhat casual sex attitude was influenced by the traumatic experience of his first deep love dying young.

My understanding is that this attitude predated Arlene's death. In his writings (I think it was What do you care what other people think?), he noted that someone told him Arlene (his then-girlfriend) was 'running around' with other guys. It was an attempt to make him jealous, but he noted that he was dating other girls, so it was only fair. (My phrasing, not his.)

It very much sounded like they were both comfortable with their relationship. Granted, this was his writing many years after the fact.

I don't think the claims that he was a womanizer are relevant or fair. People say that kind of shit about MLK to discredit him. Similar claims against Feynman don't discount his love for his wife.

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#29

Post by throwawaycities » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 6:15 PM UTC

hirundo wrote: post #7

gautamcgoel wrote: post #3

There is something indescribably vulgar about auctioning off a letter a man wrote to his dead wife. I am quite sure that when Feynman penned that letter he had no idea it would eventually be sold by strangers for profit.

Is it the selling of these historical artifacts that offends you, or just the fact that they have become public documents? I don't think we can categorically call it vulgar to make public the private correspondence of long dead historical figures. They can certainly help us understand those people better. So is it the fact that someone is making a profit from the transaction that you find disturbing? That doesn't bot…

> They can certainly help us understand those people better.

What exactly do you think you would learn about Feynman that is so important you feel your right to his personal correspondence to his wife outweighs his privacy (even from the grave).

It’s not a new or novel debate, one of the more famous discussions on the topic would be the publication of the diary of Anne Frank. Unlike Feynman she wasn’t a historical figure, until after publication of her diary. If you agree with the publication do you object to the decision to withhold publication of a number of pages and if so on what basis?

It’s also not entirely unrelated to archeology/grave robbing. What exactly gives people/governments the right to dig up and loot tombs? Courts are still trying to figure out the remedies where those bodies/artifacts were taken by foreign governments and are currently being proudly displayed in foreign museums to the public. Presumably you might think it tasteless to go down to a local cemetery and begin digging up graves in search for jewelry and personal affects, but would being a “historical figure” really change your mind? Do you not see the connection? If not what is your moral distinction since you don’t think it’s tasteless so long as the market is deciding the value?

Re: No Other Love: Letters from Richard Feynman to His Late Wife, Arline

#30

Post by BoxOfRain » Sat, Dec 25, 2021, 6:46 PM UTC

kaiwen1 wrote: post #14

gautamcgoel wrote: post #3

There is something indescribably vulgar about auctioning off a letter a man wrote to his dead wife. I am quite sure that when Feynman penned that letter he had no idea it would eventually be sold by strangers for profit.

Perhaps it's just too soon? Would you feel the same about Solomon's letters to his (first) wife? Or Mark Antony's letters to Cleopatra?

I think a reasonable bar is when a person passes out of living memory. Once it’s reasonably likely the last person who knew them is also dead, there’s no material harm that can be done by revealing their correspondence and the benefit to historians would outweigh any potential hurts to living people’s memory of someone.