Marilyn Monroe’s Private Love Letters To Be Auctioned

Marilyn Monroe died in 1962 and now over 300 personal items, including her private love letters, are going up for auction to the highest bidders. It’s been over 50 years since the tragic death of movie icon Marilyn Monroe made headlines around the world. Her timeless beauty and personality are traits that many women aspire to be, and many men desired to have. Her love affairs are legendary and include famous actors, playwrights, athletes, and even a president, as reported by the Inquisitr, and still make front page news, which is why this upcoming auction will surely fetch high bids.

Auction owner Darren Julien estimates the pieces could fetch $1 million or more, noting a watercolor Monroe painted and planned to give to President John Kennedy went for $80,000 at an estate auction nine years ago. Monroe’s popularity has skyrocketed in recent years, driven in part by deep-pocketed Asian and European collectors with a fondness for American pop-culture artifacts, he said.

“It really gives you the chills when you read some of the stuff and see the intimacy and the personal nature of it,” said auction curator Martin Nolan, who spent nine months organizing and cataloging the collection, as reported by the Associated Press.

Joe DiMaggio married Monroe in 1954, and although they had a tumultuous relationship from the start, which was fueled by his jealousy over her sex symbol status, Monroe was his greatest love. As reported in the New York Daily News, some quotes from DiMaggio’s letters to her clearly showed his undying love.

“I love you and want to be with you,” DiMaggio wrote in one of his love letter to Monroe, written when she publicly announced she was filing for divorce from him after just nine months of marriage.

“There is nothing I would like better than to restore your confidence in me. My heart split even wider seeing you cry in front of all these people,” he wrote in the letter addressed to “Mrs. Joe DiMaggio.”

After her death, DiMaggio remained heartbroken and for the next 20 years, he had flowers delivered to Marilyn’s grave twice a week.

Following her divorce from DiMaggio, Monroe married playwright Arthur Miller in 1956 and they too had a difficult marriage. In love letters to Monroe, Miller candidly wrote his feeling about her previous relationships.

“I can hate every man you were ever with but I can’t hate you.”

In another love letter before they married, Miller wrote a powerful description on how he saw her vulnerability.

“You were placed in the jaws of this society without the protection of a family, a name, an identity; it is quite as though you were the pure victim,” wrote Miller. “I do know how desperately you want to shake loose from all the dragging horrors of the past.”

After six years of marriage, Miller and Monroe divorced.

“It’s fantastic to see how loved she was,” Nolan said. “Like you thought she was vulnerable and not loved and she craved love and she needed that reassurance. But she had it. She had it with Joe DiMaggio. She had it with Arthur Miller.”