The English term “man of letters” has a nice double meaning. She can mean a “man of letters” or of words, a man of letters, a poet or thinker. But it can also refer to a “man of letters”, a postman who does not write but delivers. In the American film Late Fame by Kent Jones both are true. Willem Dafoe plays Ed Saxberger, an older New Yorker employed at the post office. When he was young, he was briefly considered a promising poet, but now he doesn’t want to know much about it anymore. If he harbors a grudge about his soon-to-be-depleted inspiration, he doesn’t show much of it.
