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A number of John Lennon’s letters, including teenage ones sent to his first girlfriend, Cynthia, were published in the book The John Lennon Letters. Lennon and Cynthia met in art school and would eventually marry and share a son together. While their relationship did not end well, their early days together were full of romance. Lennon wrote her a lengthy letter for their first Christmas together. In it, he begged her to stay with him.

A black and white picture of John Lennon standing with his arm around Cynthia Lennon's shoulders.
Cynthia Lennon and John Lennon | Douglas Miller/Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

John Lennon met his girlfriend, Cynthia at art school

Long before he was a famous musician, Lennon attended the Liverpool College of Art. Here, he met Cynthia, a fellow student. At the time, she was dating someone else and didn’t think Lennon was her type. 

“When I’d first looked at John I’d thought, Yuck, not my type,” she wrote in her book John. “With his teddy-boy look — DA (duck’s arse) haircut, narrow drainpipe trousers, and a battered old coat that was too big for him — he was very different from the clean-cut boys I was used to.”

When she saw him play music, however, she witnessed a different, softer side to him.

“It softened…. All the aggression lifted,” she said, per the book John Lennon: The Life by Philip Norman. “At last there was something I had seen in John that I could understand.”

Eventually, the two began a relationship and remained together until 1968.

John Lennon wrote a letter to his girlfriend asking her not to leave him

In 1958, shortly after Lennon and Cynthia began dating, he wrote her a romantic, eight-page letter. Under the heading “OUR FIRST XMAS!” Lennon drew a picture of himself and Cynthia standing, facing one another. On the final page, he drew another picture of them, this time from behind, with their arms around each other. Above them, he wrote the message, “I hope it won’t be the last.”

In between the drawings were messages of love from Lennon to Cynthia. On the letter’s sixth page, he wrote, “I love you so don’t leave me I love you so don’t leave me leave don’t leave me I love you Cynthia …” (via Vanity Fair).

The letter shows a much softer side than Lennon presented to the public. Lennon hadn’t seen his father in years, and his mother had died not long before he wrote the letter. In writing it, he may have been showing his vulnerability and desire to be close to someone. 

Some of his letters were much harsher

Not all of Lennon’s letters in The John Lennon Letters were as loving as the one to Cynthia. In fact, many of them were very angry. He wrote frustrated letters to a number of publications for the way they covered his relationship with Yoko Ono. In another, Lennon berated Paul and Linda McCartney. 

“I don’t resent your husband – I’m sorry for him,” he wrote. “I know the Beatles are ‘quite nice people’ – I’m one of them – they’re also just as big bastards as anyone else.”

Lennon also predicted that the McCartneys’ marriage would end in just a few years.

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