When Prophecy Still Had a Voice The Letters of Thomas Merton and Robert Lax

"These letters of two poets and solitaries betray a giddy delight in wordplay, unconstrained by rules of grammar or conventions of spelling. Puns, portmanteaus, and inside jokes abound. The thiry-year exchange began when Merton dashed off a note on June 17, 1938, after spending a week with Lax's family. The final epistle in their correspondence was written by Lax on December 8, 1968. Merton died in Bangkok five days later and never received it." "Arthur Biddle spent nearly ten years collecting every letter known to exist between Merton and Lax, a total of 346, two-thirds of which have never been published. Biddle provides chronologies of their lives and, through unobtrusive notes, places events and people in context within the letters. This volume also includes the text of a rare interview with Lax."--BOOK JACKET.