SOURCE: "Yours, Fred," in the New York Times Book Review, April 25, 1965, p. 44.

In the following review of Fred Allen's Letters, Nichols excerpts some of Allen's wittiest letters.

Fred Allen died in 1956, and less than a decade later he has been almost forgotten. Show business moves faster than the rest of life, radio show business perhaps fastest of all, and his star was the brightest in radio. Ex-vaudeville, ex-theater (Three's a Crowd), he moved into radio in '32, and for the next 17 years was up there with the best of them, comedian on behalf of Texaco, Ford. Then came both ill health and TV and a decline, until now it is almost necessary to say who he was. The occasion just now is the publication of Fred Allen's Letters, edited and with an introduction by Joe McCarthy.

Allen was a compulsive letter writer, pouring out his thoughts to friends...