The Magic of Handwriting. The Pedro Corra do Lago Collection

About this book

Handwriting works magic: it transports us back to defining moments in history creativity and everyday life and connects us intimately with the people who marked the page. For nearly half a century Brazilian author and publisher Pedro Corra do Lago has been assembling one of the most comprehensive autograph collections of our era acquiring thousands of handwritten letters manuscripts and musical compositions as well as inscribed photographs documents and drawings. From an 1153 parchment signed by four medieval popes to a 2006 thumbprint signature by physicist Stephen Hawking the items illustrated here span nearly nine hundred years and along the way bring us up close and personal with writers artists composers political figures performers explorers scientists philosophers and rebels whose actions and creations have made them legends. Rather than focusing on a single era or subject Corra do Lago made the ambitious decision to seek important autographs in eight broad areas of human endeavorart history literature science music philosophy exploration and entertainment. The 140 extraordinary selections gathered in this bookdisplayed for the first time in a major exhibition at New Yorks Morgan Library and Museuminclude letters by Lucrezia Borgia Vincent van Gogh and Emily Dickinson annotated sketches by Michelangelo Jean Cocteau and Charlie Chaplin and manuscripts by Giacomo Puccini Jorge Luis Borges and Marcel Proust. Handwriting is one of the most visceral means by which we leave tracks of our existence. At a time when so much of our communication has become utterly immaterial this collection conveys the power of the pen to illuminate the energy passion vulnerability and imagination of humankind across the ages.