40 Love Letters From Iconic Stars That Will Restore Your Faith In Romance

You only ever see one side of the famous; whether they’re on the silver screen, performing to adoring audiences or even leading a country. Their real personalities come out when they’re at their most vulnerable, but they don’t often let that side show. That’s why it’s such a surprise to read stars’ secret love letters — some penned to equally-as-famous faces. Even those who put up a wall while walking the red carpet have poured their heart into these private messages. Now, it’s your turn to read how they told their loved ones exactly how they felt.

40. John Steinbeck to Gwyn Steinbeck

John Steinbeck would have three wives in his lifetime, but he penned this fiery love letter to his second spouse, Gwyn. Eventually, the pair divorced in 1948 after she became jealous of his literary success. But before then, the couple felt inseparable — at least, from his point of view. The Grapes of Wrath author wrote to her in 1943, “I want you to keep this thing we have inviolate and waiting — the person who is neither I nor you but us…”

39. Charlotte Brontë to her English professor, Constantin Heger

Jane Eyre author Charlotte Brontë fell for her English professor, Constantin Heger, and she admitted as much in an 1845 love letter. She wrote, “You showed me of yore a little interest, when I was your pupil in Brussels, and I hold on to the maintenance of that little interest — I hold on to it as I would hold on to life.” Unfortunately, there’s no evidence that he ever reciprocated her very deep feelings.

38. Ted Hughes to Sylvia Plath

Those familiar with Sylvia Plath’s work will know about her tragic love for fellow poet Ted Hughes. Their split — he left her and their children for another woman — is thought to be one reason she ended her own life. At the beginning of their relationship, though, their affection for one another was palpable. Hughes wrote to her, “I wish this year were over and our wedding in America were over and I were just laying you down on the bed.”

37. Marlon Brando to his flight attendant

Marlon Brando was one the greatest screen actors of the 20th century. And, as it turns out, he was a skilled love letter writer, as well. He once penned a flirtatious note to a flight attendant who caught his eye. Brando gushed, “…Somehow by the mystery of genetic phenomena you have been visited by the gifts of refinement, dignity and poise…” He then wished that he and the stewardess “[would] have occasion to cross eyes again sometime.”

36. Leo Tolstoy to Valeria Arsenev

Leo Tolstoy married Sonya Behrs in 1862, but she was far from the only woman in his life. The Anna Karenina author penned a passionate love letter to Valeria Arsenev six years prior to his wedding. He touchingly wrote, “I already love you in your beauty, but I am only beginning to love in you that which is eternal and ever previous — your heart, your soul…”

35. Amelia Earhart to George Putnam

Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic in 1932. For all of her courage, though, the aviator felt a bit more unsure of her impending marriage to George Putnam, who she wed in 1931. Before the wedding she wrote, “You must know again my reluctance to marry, my feeling that I shatter thereby chances in work which means most to me.” But the famous aviator eventually promised, “I will try to do my best in every way and give you that part of me you know and seem to want.”

34. Victor Hugo to Adèle Foucher

Sometimes, all it takes is a letter. Victor Hugo so desperately wanted to marry Adèle Foucher that he wrote a passionate note to her in 1821 — and they wed the following year. The Les Miserables author persuaded her by writing, “This union is love; real and perfect love, such love as very few men can adequately conceive… It is such love as this that you inspire in me…”

33. George H.W. Bush to Barbara Bush

George H.W. Bush may have been a one-term president, but his love for his wife, Barbara, lasted a lifetime. When he shipped out with the Navy during World War II, he penned many a letter to her, although only one such note remains. In it, he imagined their future together, writing, “I love you, precious, with all my heart and to know that you love me means my life. How often I have thought about the immeasurable joy that will be ours some day. How lucky our children will be to have a mother like you…”

32. Vita Sackville-West to Virginia Woolf

Both Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West drew major inspiration from their ong affair. Woolf based her 1928 novel, Orlando, on her lover. Meanwhile, Sackville-West wrote emotional love letters to the Woolf. One note read, “…You have no idea how standoffish I can be with people I don’t love. I have brought it to a fine art. But you have broken down my defenses. And I don’t really resent it.”

31. Jean-Paul Sartre to Simone de Beauvoir

Revolutionary thinkers Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir had a decades-long relationship, although they never actually married. Still, their devotion to one another was clear — this letter from Sartre to her corroborates the strength of their bond. He wrote, “ I love you while paying attention to external things. At Toulouse I simply loved you. Tonight I love you on a spring evening. I love you with the window open. You are mine…”

30. Prince Albert to Queen Victoria

We often hear about royal couples who married for political gain, but Queen Victoria’s marriage to Prince Albert was one filled with genuine love and affection. This love letter from him to her proves it. Albert’s passionate note reads, “Even in my dreams I never imagined that I should find so much love on earth. How that moment shines for me still when I was close to you, with your hand in mine…” He then concludes the message by promising “unchanging love and devotion.”

29. Mark Twain to Olivia Langdon

It took two proposals — and several letters — to get Olivia Langdon to agree to marry Mark Twain. It’s no wonder the legendary author’s words swayed her, either. In one message, he wrote, “Out of the depths of my happy heart wells a great tide of love and prayer for this priceless treasure that is confined to my life-long keeping. You cannot see its intangible waves as they flow towards you, darling, but in these lines you will hear, as it were, the distant beating of the surf.”

28. Richard Nixon to Pat Nixon

President Richard Nixon pursued his future wife, Pat, for years — he even drove her to her dates with other men while they courted. He eventually won her affection, though, and it his love notes may well have had something to do with it. One touching message to the future First Lady read, “...And when the wind blows and the rains fall and the sun shines through the clouds (as it is now) he still resolves, as he did then, that nothing so fine ever happened to him or anyone else as falling in love with Thee — my dearest heart.”

27. Abigail Adams to John Adams

It’s not always presidents that write love letters to their first ladies — sometimes, it’s the other way around. Abigail Adams, wife of the second Commander-in-Chief, John Adams, penned this gorgeous message in 1782: “Should I draw you the picture of my heart it would be what I hope you would still love though it contained nothing new. The early possession you obtained there, and the absolute power you have obtained over it, leaves not the smallest space unoccupied.”

26. Oscar Wilde to Constance Wilde

Poet and novelist Oscar Wilde seems to have enjoyed writing love letters — he’ll appear more than once on this list, after all. He sent one such message to his wife, Constance, who he married in 1884. The Picture of Dorian Gray author wrote longingly to her, saying, “I feel your fingers in my hair, and your cheek brushing mine. The air is full of the music of your voice, my soul and body seem no longer mine, but mingled in some exquisite ecstasy with yours. I feel incomplete without you…”

25. Richard Burton to Elizabeth Taylor

Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton’s had chemistry they couldn’t ignore while filming 1963’s Cleopatra. It spurred her to divorce her then-husband Eddie Fisher and marry her co-star. But she and Burton eventually split, too, and he wrote this letter after they made it official. The actor wrote, “All I care about — honest to God — is that you are happy and I don't much care who you'll find happiness with. [...] God's eye may be on the sparrow but my eye will always be on you…” More on these two later.

24. Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn

Speaking of tempestuous couples, several love letters sent from King Henry VIII to his second of six wives, Anne Boleyn, survive today. Their love didn’t last as long, of course — he eventually had her beheaded so he could marry Jane Seymour. But before then, his affections were only for Anne. At the outset of their relationship he wrote, “The longer the days are, the more distant is the sun, and nevertheless the hotter; so is it with our love, for by absence we are kept a distance from one another, and yet it retains its fervour…”

23. Anaïs Nin to Henry Miller

As we’ve learned already, professional writers penning love notes to other literary greats makes for passionate reading. Anaïs Nin once wrote a spectacular message to her lover and fellow writer, Henry Miller, gushing over his joie de vivre. It read, “Before, I almost used to think there was something wrong. Everybody else seemed to have the brakes on. […] I never feel the brakes. I overflow. And when I feel your excitement about life flaring, next to mine, then it makes me dizzy.”

22. Vladimir Nabokov to Vera Nabokov

Vladimir and Vera Nabokov met in Berlin in 1923, and that introduction sparked a romance that endured for more than a half-century. An early letter he sent her described how he felt about his new love. The Lolita author wrote, “I won’t hide it: I’m so unused to being — well, understood, perhaps, — so unused to it, that in the very first minutes of our meeting I thought: this is a joke… But then… And there are things that are hard to talk about — you’ll rub off their marvelous pollen at the touch of a word… You are lovely…”

21. Patti Smith to Robert Mapplethorpe

Artist Robert Mapplethorpe was one of the great loves of musician Patti Smith’s life. Their relationship ended when he started dating men, but their affection and friendship endured until his death in 1989. At that time, she penned him a heartbreaking posthumous letter that concluded, “It occurred to me looking around at all of your things and your work and going through years of work in my mind, that of all your work, you are still your most beautiful. The most beautiful work of all.”

20. Emily Dickinson to Susan Huntington Gilbert

Experts only have love letters sent from Emily Dickinson to Susan Huntington Gilbert, and none returned to the poet. Still, they believe the affection she felt for Gilbert — her future sister-in-law — was reciprocated. After all, it’d be hard to send such revealing messages without knowing how the person on the other end felt. For example, Dickinson once admitted, “My heart is full of you, none other than you is in my thoughts, yet when I seek to say to you something not for the world, words fail me…”

19. Winston Churchill to Clementine Churchill

Winston Churchill served as British Prime Minister during World War II, and, yet, that pressure never seemed to strain his marriage to Clementine. The pair were wed for 56 years, and even more than two decades into their union, he still wrote her love letters. This one from 1935 read, “…I always feel so overwhelmingly in your debt, if there can be accounts in love… What it has been to me to live all these years in your heart and companionship no phrases can convey.”

18. George Carlin to Sally Wade

Comedian George Carlin made people laugh with his caustic stand-up. And yet, he showed off a softer side in a love note to his wife, Sally Wade. He wrote, “If you took the number of subatomic particles in the universe and multiplied that number times itself that many times; and then added the total number of microseconds since the beginning of time, times itself; and then added 803 — you would still have only the tiniest fraction of a billion-billionth percent of the amount of love I have for you.” Awww.

17. John Keats to Fanny Brawne

John Keats had a passionate desire to be with his neighbor, Fanny Brawne. In 1819, the poet wrote to her, “My love has made me selfish. I cannot exist without you – I am forgetful of everything but seeing you again.” But their happily ever after was never to be. Keats moved to Rome as a last-ditch effort to help his tuberculosis, but he succumbed to the disease in early 1921. His heartbroken girlfriend spent the next six years mourning his death at the tragically young age of 25.

16. Gerald Ford and Betty Ford

During her tenure as America’s Second Lady – the wife of then-Vice President and eventual President, Gerald Ford – Betty Ford found out she had breast cancer. Undergoing a mastectomy while in the public eye shed much-needed light on the disease, and the nation rallied behind her. Of course, her husband did, too. He wrote her a letter at the time: “No written words can adequately express our deep, deep love. We know how great you are and we, the children and Dad, will try to be as strong as you.”

15. Charlie Parker to Chan Woods

Saxophonist Charlie Parker helped develop bebop, the fast-paced yet harmonic faction of jazz music. Turns out that he could write in a similarly melodic love letter. This stunningly beautiful message went out to Chan Woods, the musician’s common-law wife. It read, “Beautiful is the world, slow is one to take advantage. Wind up the world the other way. And at the start of the turning of the earth, lie my feelings for thou.”

14. Dana Reeve to Christopher Reeve

The Superman star Christopher Reeve and his wife, Dana, went through the unthinkable. He fell from a horse in 1995, breaking his neck, leaving him permanently paralyzed — and Dana stood by his side through it all. Less than a year later, she wrote to him, “…For all the brambles and obstructions that have come our way of late, I have no regrets. In fact, all of our difficulties have shown me how deeply I love you…”

13. Napoleon Bonaparte to Joséphine de Beauharnais

As soon as Napoleon Bonaparte met socialite Joséphine de Beauharnais, he was smitten. And he made sure to let her know by penning her love letter after love letter when they were apart. The French Emperor once gushed, “The charms of the incomparable Josephine kindle continually a burning and a glowing flame in my heart… I thought that I loved you months ago, but since my separation from you I feel that I love you a thousand fold more.”

12. Jimi Hendrix to a mystery woman

Not all celebrity love letters land on the desk of an equally-as-famous recipient. In the case of guitarist Jimi Hendrix… well, no one knows who won his heart in this instance — he addressed her only as “little girl.” He sweetly advised her, “Happiness is within you… so unlock the chains from your heart and let yourself grow — like the sweet flower you are…”

11. Zelda Fitzgerald to F. Scott Fitzgerald

Zelda Fitzgerald once wrote to her husband, novelist Scott, “…It's like begging for mercy of a storm or killing beauty or growing old, without you. I want to kiss you so — and in the back where your dear hair starts and your chest – I love you — and I can't tell you how much…” The pair’s fairytale love story would eventually crumble as his drinking increased — and his friend, Ernest Hemingway, would blame Zelda for Scott’s diminished literary creativity in later life.

10. Ernest Hemingway to Marlene Dietrich

Speaking of Hemingway, the man penned a love letter or two in his time. This one went out to Hollywood icon, Marlene Dietrich, with whom he supposedly shared  a close friendship and nothing more. He touchingly wrote, “I can’t say how every time I ever put my arms around you I felt that I was home.”

9. Edgar Allan Poe to Mrs. Sarah Helene Whitman

Edgar Allan Poe made a name for himself as a master of the macabre. But the writer had a much more tender side when it came to the women who caught his eye. In 1848 he wrote to Mrs. Sarah Helene Whitman, “...As your eyes rested for one brief moment upon mine, I felt, for the first time in my life, and tremblingly acknowledged, the existence of spiritual influences altogether out of the reach of the reason.”

8. Elizabeth Taylor to Richard Burton

Remember how we said we’d get back to Taylor and Burton? Well, here’s her love letter to him — and it’s so much more romantic since she wrote it while they were still a couple. Taylor wrote, “I wish I could tell you of my love for you, of my fear, my delight, my pure animal pleasure of you… I wish I could write about it but I can’t. I can only 'boil and bubble' inside and hope you understand how I really feel.”

7. Oscar Wilde to Lord Alfred Douglas

Here’s another double-entry on our list. Oscar Wilde wrote a love letter to his wife… but he also penned one to Lord Alfred Douglas, a younger poet who started off as his muse and eventually became his lover. Wilde had no trouble talking up his beau’s good looks, writing, “Those red-rose leaf lips of yours should be made no less for the madness of music and song than for the madness of kissing. Your slim gilt soul walks between passion and poetry.”

6. Orson Welles to Rita Hayworth

The great actor-director married Rita Hayworth in 1943, and clearly missed her when they were apart. He wrote to her, “You are my life – my very life. Never imagine your hope approximates what you are to me. Beautiful, precious little baby — hurry up the sun! — make the days shorter till we meet. I love you, that's all there is to it.” For all of that romance, the actress later revealed that their marriage failed because Welles had no desire to be tied to her and her alone.

5. Frida Kahlo to Diego Rivera

Mexican painters Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera met, fell in love, and went on to spend their lives traveling and creating art. Not all of her masterpieces were visual, though. As Kahlo once wrote to her beau, “Remember that once you finish the fresco we will be together forever once and for all, without arguments or anything, only to love one another.” And that’s precisely what they did until her death in 1954.

4. Ronald Reagan to Nancy Reagan

After 31 years of marriage, Ronald Reagan still had the fondest of words for his beloved wife, Nancy. The then-President, aboard Air Force One, wrote her in 1983, “…I more than love you, I'm not whole without you. You are life itself to me. When you are gone I'm waiting for you to return so I can start living again…”

3. Marilyn Monroe to Joe DiMaggio

Monroe once wrote to her second husband, baseball legend Joe DiMaggio, “I love you till my heart could burst. All I love, all I want, all I need is you — forever. I want to be just where you are and be just what you want me to be.” Their union didn’t last, but their love for one another surely did. The pair remained friends until her untimely death in 1962.

2. Beethoven to Josephine Brunsvik

Although it doesn’t feature her name, experts believe that Beethoven’s famous love letter to his “eternal beloved” went to Josephine Brunsvik. After all, the composer had sent her at least 15 similar messages over the years, many of which contained the same wording as this crushingly beautiful note in which he vowed, “I can only live, either altogether with you or not at all.” Perhaps the most touching passage comes at the end, though, when Beethoven simply concludes his letter with, “Ever thine. Ever mine. Ever ours.”

1. Johnny Cash to June Carter Cash

Reading this love note from Johnny Cash to his beloved wife, June, holds extra gravity knowing the story of their lives. He gushed in his message, “…Once in a while, like today, I meditate on it and realize how lucky I am to share my life with the greatest woman I ever met. You still fascinate and inspire me. You influence me for the better. You’re the object of my desire, the #1 Earthly reason for my existence…” When she passed away in 2003, he died a mere four months later — some say of a broken heart.