A rare collection of letters by prominent figures,  including those of Tchaikovsky, Tolstoy, and Gagarin, is going under the hammer at Sotheby's in New York.

In a series of thirty-one manuscripts from a private collection, Leo Tolstoy used  four sheets of paper to expound on love.

Dostoevsky took great satisfaction in writing a letter to an admirer of his work, thanking her for her kind words. The letter does not give any clues as to which of his novels so impressed his admirer. It is dated the 3rd. of March 1876, and is estimated to be worth $US 20,000-30,000, a sign of  the public's growing curiosity in the great writer's correspondence.

Another true rarity are two letters by the renowned Stalin. The first one is expected to sell for $US 30,000-50,000. Joseph Stalin used a pencil and only eight lines to commute the death sentence of Andrei Snesaryev – Chief of the Red Army's Academy of the General Staff. As for the second letter, the same strong handwriting is used to answer a letter written by his daughter Svetlana.

These letters are direct links to some of the great thinkers and leaders of the past. The art of letter writing is a rarity these days and their value can only increase in time.