Latka

You’d have to go all the way back to the epistles of Abigail Adams and the poems of Emily Dickinson to find such a profound articulation of the soul of American womanhood as the stunning new collection of never-before-published letters, “Dear Andy Kaufman, I Hate Your Guts!,” forthcoming from the fine folks at Process Books.

In 1977, Kaufman offered a $1000 reward to any woman who could pin him in a televised wrestling match, vowing to shave his head and wed his vanquisher. His taunt spurred an impassioned response from hundreds of would-be contenders from across our great land, from all-CAPS typewritten manifestos to hand-scrawled hate mail accompanied by photos and illustrations that Process rightly calls “an astonishing Rorschach of the late-‘70s liberated female psyche.”

Samples leave us in humbled awe and ever more mindful of how much we miss the pranking spirit of our dear departed Latka: