Letter Writing

A letter is such a written message that we sent to persons who are far away from us and we want to convey our message to them in a clear and forceful manner. We usually write letters to our friends and relatives. Although the advent of IT- Telephones, Mobile SMS’s and Chat- has reduced the importance of personal letter writing as we can send our messages through these mediums very easily but this art is still required where there is need of formal communication. Sometimes we have to send an application to the school for grant of leave and at other time we have to complain about someone. The same way we get a lot of chances where we have to send a formal letter. Thus this art of letter writing is no more an ornamental accomplishment but something that every educated person must acquire for practical purposes.

• Informal Letter Writing
• Business Letter Writing 
• Official Letter Writing 
• Letter Writing Rules
• Letter Writing Examples
• Letter Writing Samples

There are many types of letter writing but most of the English grammar letter writing deals with the following given categories:-

Informal Letter Writing

These types of letter are written to relatives or friends. These can also include invitations etc. Such kinds of a letter are also known as Personal or Social Letters.

Business Letter Writing

These letters are used as a communicative tool in the business and are usually written by the traders, firms and companies etc for business purposes. These kinds of letter fall under the category of formal letters.

Official Letter Writing

These include a letter of application, letter to government officials and letter to Newspapers etc. These letters are used for the official communication of the information from one department to another. Ex:- Termination letter, Recommendation letter, Reference letter, job letter etc

Irrespective of the type of letter there is a certain matter of forms which are applicable all and have to be taken care of while writing any kind of letter to make it impressive and purposeful.

Letter Writing Rules

Main six Points that has to be taken care of while writing a letter are:-

1. Heading
2. The Salutation or Courteous Greetings
3. The Body of the letter -Communication or the Message-.
4. The Subscription -Courteous Leave-taking, or Conclusion-.
5. The Signature -Name of the writer-
6. The Address

1.  Heading of a letter basically consists of Two Parts:

1. address of the writer followed by
2. the date on which the letter was written by him.

Heading can be written on the Right or Left (keep on changing with time-presently we follow the convention of writing Heading in the left corner) corner of the first page of the letter.

Examples of a Heading are:-

2. The Salutation in the letter will depend upon the depth of relationship of the writer with the person to whom the letter is being written thus vary from letter to letter. 

The salutation is written at the left hand of the page, at a lower level the Heading. The first and last word of the salutation is always started in Capital Alphabets.

3. The Body itself is considered as the life of the letter and the style in which it is written will depend upon the kind of letter one wishes to write. Like, the style of the letter to be written to a friend will be entirely different from the style of the letter to be written to an official and so on. But few points that one has to keep in mind irrespective of the style while writing the body of the letter are:-

• Divide the letter into paragraphs, to mark changes of subject-matter etc.
• Use simple and direct language in short sentences. It will make the message clear and to the point
• Always try to be complete. For this think out what you want to say before the beginning of writing of letter, and put down all the point in a logical manner.
• Write neatly to avoid inconvenience to the reader because of your bad penmanship.
• Take care of the punctuation and be consistent with it. Incorrect punctuation may alter the whole meaning of the sentence.

Besides letter can be make impressive to leave an indelible mark on the reader we can use following given starting and ending with the various kind of letters:-

4.  The Subscription of the letter ie the end should be according to the staring of the letter. A letter must not end abruptly as this would look rude. So certain forms of polite leave-taking are prescribed That should be written after the last words of the letter on the left-hand side corner of the lines after the body. It should start with a Capital letter and end with a comma. Some examples of the subscription of the letter of various kinds are:-

• To Blood Relations: Yours affectionately,
• To Friends: Yours Sincerely,
• To Principal/Headmaster/Teacher etc: Yours Obediently,
• To Officials/Businessmen: Yours faithfully,
• To Strangers: Yours truly,

Note:- Never use an apostrophe(‘) with yours in the subscription.  

5.  The Signature of the writer of the letter should be below the subscription. In a letter to the stranger, the signature should be clearly written so that he could know whom to address in reply.

Note: A women should prefix to the name Miss or Mrs. or Ms in brackets before her name like

 (Miss) Preetinder Kaur

6.  The Address is written on the envelope of the postcard very clearly with a pin code.

Letter Writing Examples

 Examples of Letters - Click on the Link to know more

Free Letter Writing Samples

Business Letter Sample (placing order)
Informal Letter Sample (apology)
Official Letter (job termination)