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Berchtesgaden
August 10, 1929
Dear Edward
That is of course quite an impossible suggestion. A biography is justified under two conditions. First, if the subject has had a share in important, generally interesting events; second, as a psychological study. Outwardly my life has passed calmly and uneventfully and can be covered by a few dates. A psychologically complete and honest confession of life, on the other hand, would require so much indiscretion (on my part as well as on that of others) about family, friends, and enemies, most of them still alive, that it is simply out of the question. What makes all autobiographies worthless is, after all, their mendacity.
Incidentally, it is American naïveté on the part of your publisher to expect a hitherto decent person to commit so base a deed for $5,000. For me temptation might begin at a hundred times that sum, but even then it would be turned down after half an hour.
In the hope that you and your wife and daughter are in good health, I greet you cordially.
Your uncle
Sigm.