Lyrics to
The Letter

This version of The Letter was released by Dolly Parton in 1973.

Our About Dolly Parton page at Decade Lyrics includes the lyrics for The Letter from 1973 as well as all of the other lyrics from Dolly Parton that we have in our lyrics database.

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This is the first letter that I wrote back home to Momma and Daddy a few days after I’d moved to Nashville:

June 2, 1964
Nashville, Tennessee

Dear Momma and Daddy,

I hope this letter finds everybody well and happy. As for me, I’m fine I guess. I’m just a little lonesome and a whole lot homesick. I got to Nashville okay and I thought I’d better write and let you know cause I knew you’d be worried about me and I don’t want you to be worried about me cause I’m gonna be alright once I get settled and used to being away from home. I didn’t realize how much I loved you and all them noisy kids until I left and I didn’t realize how hard it was to leave home either til I started to leave and everybody started crying, including me. I cried almost all the way to Nashville and I wanted to turn around a few times and come back but you know how bad I’ve always wanted to go to Nashville and be a singer and songwriter and I believe that if I try long enough and hard enough that someday I’ll make it. Don’t worry about trying to sending me any money or anything cause I’ve got a job singing on the early morning television show here called the Eddie Hill Show. A couple of folks already told me that they might record a couple of my songs so I’ll be making enough money to get by and I don’t want you worrying about me being hungry or anything. Nashville is not exactly what I thought it was gonna be, but I believe I’m gonna like it here once I get used to it. And I don’t want you worrying about me getting in trouble either cause I’ll be good just like I promised you I would when I left. Well, can’t think of anything else to say. I guess I’d better close for now. You write me real soon. Tell everybody I said hello and I’m gonna be real anxious to hear from you cause I sure miss you and I love you an awful lot.

With love as always,

-Dolly

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Want more lyrics and songs by Dolly Parton?

Dolly Parton has released many songs over the years besides The Letter. Dolly Parton released songs from 1967 to 2005 spanning across albums like Hello, I'm Dolly, Just Because I'm A Woman, My Blue Ridge Mountain Boy, In The Good Old Days, As Long As I Love, The Fairest Of Them All, A Real Live Dolly, Coat Of Many Colors, The Golden Streets Of Glory, Joshua, Touch Your Woman, My Favorite Songwriter: Porter Wagoner, Bubbling Over, My Tennessee Mountain Home, Love Is Like A Butterfly, Jolene, Dolly: The Seeker / We Used To, The Bargain Store, All I Can Do, New Harvest... First Gathering, Here You Come Again, Heartbreaker, Great Balls Of Fire, 9 To 5 And Odd Jobs, Dolly, Dolly, Dolly, Heartbreak Express, The Best Little Whorehouse In Texas, Burlap & Satin, Rhinestone, The Great Pretender, Real Love, Rainbow, White Limozeen, Home For Christmas, Eagle When She Flies, Straight Talk, Slow Dancing With The Moon, Heartsongs: Live From Home, Something Special, Treasures, Hungry Again, The Grass Is Blue, Precious Memories, Little Sparrow, Halos & Horns, For God And Country, and Those Were The Days. Decade Lyrics has over lyrics & songs by Dolly Parton.

If you're a fan of popular 1970s songs looking for more songs from 1973 or the 1970s overall, you've come to the right place!

About Lyrics and The Letter by Dolly Parton

When you decide to study the lyrics to The Letter, you're looking at the words, verses and background chorus from the 1973 song by Dolly Parton. Some of the lyrics to The Letter have clear meanings and some contain metaphorical references. Like most songs, only Dolly Parton and their collaborators know the full story behind any of the their songs.

You can understand the lyrics to The Letter if you take apart the structure of the words. The word "lyric" itself derives from the Latin word lyricus, with the actual English word lyrics applied to the definition "words set to music" listed in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Continuing the chain, the Latin word lyricus derives from the Greek word λυρικός or lyrikós. This somewhat means "poetry accompanied by the lyre" or "words set to music." You can easily see that by looking at the background of the word lyric, that the "lyrics to The Letter" means the words set to the music of The Letter, or poetry accompanied by the lyre played by Dolly Parton. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song. However, the singular form lyric is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics. Hence, by this analysis of word structure, you could say that the lyric to The Letter and the lyrics to The Letter are both one and the same thing. None of this talk about the word Lyrics is really relevant to fans of Dolly Parton who came here looking just for the lyrics to The Letter, but we feel it is still fun to learn what's behind commonly used words and lyrics in songs.

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