Am I being unreasonable to read love letters belonging to my grandparents (now deceased).

[LadyMacbethWasMisunderstood]

My aunt has just loaned me a couple of albums of (previously unseen by me) photographs of my grandparents through their younger years,, so I can scan them. I am 53 now. I adored my grandparents, was very close to them and have nothing but positive memories of them. They died 20 years ago within a few months of each other. When she passed the albums over my aunt mentioned that in the back of one of the albums there were love letters from my grandfather to my grandmother when he was serving in the RAF during WW2. She said she has looked through them but they were difficult to decipher. She was entirely neutral as to whether I should read them or not. I’m tempted. But I also feel it’s an intrusion.

Just to be clear - I’m not agonising over this. Would just like to get a feel for the “mood” on this issue. Until today I never knew they existed.

My aunt is visiting from a fair distance. She will be taking the albums back with her next week. I might not get another chance.

To assist voting.

YABU - do not read
YANBU - go ahead and read them.

(Though I really am on the fence about it).

@DramaAlpaca

Read them. They are part of your history too.

No they absolutely are not. The grandparents, yes, the letters between them? Fucking private.

We are all part of someone's history. We all have a right to some privacy though.

I recently read my grandparents love letters, written just before and during ww2 when my grandad was a POW. It was for a ww2 project ds was doing at school. I had tears steaming down my face reading them. They were just teenagers and the writing was beautiful and their love for each other shone through. I was very close to them growing up so I don't think they would have minded. Their letters are living history and I learnt a lot from them.

For those who say no its private etc, would you/have you read Anne Frank's Diary?

Surely if we want that privacy after we're dead we can do what HamishDent's ILs did and get rid of the letters?

(Exception here, obviously, for people who die unexpectedly before their time.)

I think there is a fair assumption that if someone keeps their correspondence accessible in an album and does nothing about destroying it & doesn't mention in their will that they'd like it destroyed, then they're not regarding it as all that private.

I would imagine that if they were very private letters, they would've either destroyed them once they got to a certain age or left specific instructions to that effect, even if it was just storing them with a note that the letters were personal.

If you start reading them and feel they are too private, you can always stop, but I'd expect that your grandparents wouldn't mind you reading them. You'd be doing it out of love for them and an interest in knowing as much as possible about their lives. That's vastly different from someone snooping around looking for gossip.

@LonelyFromCorona

For those who say no its private etc, would you/have you read Anne Frank's Diary?

Interesting point. I fully admit I feel differently after this consideration.

I'd feel different going through the letters of someone who had died relatively young and unexpectedly, but when it's an older person who leaves behind adult children and knows they will be the ones sorting the estate, surely you'd have done something with the letters, if you didn't want them seen.

My personal correspondence that I wish to remain private is in a box clearly marked to the effect that it's not meant to be read, in case my husband and I were to die at the same time and be unable to destroy it ourselves.

Its an interesting debate.

I always wonder about letters that are shown in museums and published in books etc and what insight they give us into the past/past events. They were private in the same way, unless some kind of official correspondence. When I think of the letters dh and I sent each other, I wouldn't mind our children or grandchildren etc reading them.

@sillycow6 But it doesn’t matter. People can’t mind when they’re dead.

I absolutely wouldn't read them, no. I would hate the idea that if/when i was to pass that a family member might read deeply personal romantic (or potentially erotic) letters that i wrote intended for that person and myself alone.

People keep things that they don't want thrown away, and hardly know when exactly they will pass to make the time to dispose of them prior. That doesn't mean upon death that there should be no respect of intimacy or privacy. Rather than saying if they didn't want it seen i really feel it should be assumed someone would have already seen, or specifically been left them, if that were the intention. The person being elderly does not mean we have a right to read them.

Always makes me deeply uncomfortable that others gawk over personal correspondence in museums or as a result of financial interest. I certainly wouldn't choose to look at that if i knew and i definitely wouldn't treat a family member or friend as such.

I'm an historian by training and one of my hobbies is researching my family history. To be honest, I have done most of the research, now I just try to flesh out lives. A letter written by my 2 times great grandfather to his daughter, my great grandmother, came into my hands a few years ago. I cant tell you how much it fleshed out his personality and gave context to dry facts. I didnt even know the writer or the recipient.

Should you read your grandparents letters? I dont know how you have not done so already! It will tell you so much about them that you dont know even though you knew them in life. And how lovely to read of their love which, eventually, led to your life.

I would hate the idea that if/when i was to pass that a family member might read deeply personal romantic (or potentially erotic) letters that i wrote intended for that person and myself alone

No you wouldn’t. You’d be dead. You wouldn’t give a shit

People keep things that they don't want thrown away, and hardly know when exactly they will pass to make the time to dispose of them prior. That doesn't mean upon death that there should be no respect of intimacy or privacy. Rather than saying if they didn't want it seen i really feel it should be assumed someone would have already seen, or specifically been left them, if that were the intention. The person being elderly does not mean we have a right to read them.

There is nothing to stop someone from putting instructions about letters either on the container they are kept in or in their will, that doesn't require any knowledge about when they are going to pass. I won't be doing this because I genuinely don't mind the thought that people might read my letters when I'm gone.