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A heated letter that John Lennon wrote to Paul McCartney is up for auction
There’s 11 days left to bid, but you’ll need a fair amount of dosh if you want to get your hands on it…
Image: Bettmann / Getty
A heated letter once sent by John Lennon to Paul McCartney is up for auction, and the highest bid currently sits at $33,000.
The three-page letter was written as a response to McCartney’s interview with Melody Maker in 1971. In it, he addresses comments made by McCartney on his song Imagine, the relationship between himself and Yoko Ono, as well as the dissolution of the business partnership between The Beatles.
In the letter, Lennon labels McCartney as playing “simple, honest ole’ human Paul” in the interview and fires back about McCartney’s stance that song Imagine wasn’t political. He writes, “It’s ‘working class here’ with sugar on it for conservatives like yourself. You obviously didn’t dig the words. Imagine!” He then compares McCartney’s political stance to that of Mary Whitehouse – a conservative activist, most famous for her campaigns against the prominence of sex and swearing on British television.
It also addresses various financial clashes on royalties and tax, but does finish on a slightly less brutal note: “No hard feelings to you,” he concludes. “I know we basically want the same, and as I said on the phone and in this letter, whenever you want to meet, all you have to do is call.”
There is a P.S. of course, where Lennon adds, “The bit that really puzzled us was asking to meet WITHOUT LINDA AND YOKO… I thought you’d have understood BY NOW, that I’m JOHNANDYOKO.”
There remains 11 days left to bid on the letter, with an estimate that it could sell for as high as $40,000. The auction is being run by Gotta Have Rock And Roll, which is auctioning 90 items of The Beatles memorabilia, including George Harrison’s signed & studio played Hamer Prototype guitar.
You can read the letter in full and place a bid here.