Mel Gussow: Uproarious Pessimism
In the late 1940s, over a period of a little more than a year, Samuel Beckett wrote Molloy and Malone Dies, the first two parts of his trilogy of… More
On Wise Blood
As Flannery’s friend, as well as her editor and publisher from the start, I marveled at her excellence as a writer and regretted her early death. I first met… More
Family Secrets
One of the conditions of being a writer is that all those authors you have loved and learned from, and by necessity have taught yourself to forget, the better… More
First Love
Mrs. Dalloway is the first great book I ever read. I was fifteen, a not very promising student at a not very good public high school in Southern California,… More
Michele Serros: Small-Town Tales
"Small-Town Tales," by Michele Serros, appears in PEN America 4: Fact/Fiction. This talk was presented, in slightly different form, at a PEN Twentieth-Century Masters Tribute to John Steinbeck.Small-Town TalesAfter my… More
After the Fall
Without official approval, I should like to dedicate these proceedings to the reading groups and secret Proust readers who are here tonight, and who have produced something called a… More
Father of Choice
Life clung to Samuel Beckett, irritatingly, for eighty-three and three-quarter years. When he told me he’d lost his teeth, I mumbled an inanity: “It could be worse.” Without pause, he… More
Nadine Gordimer: Cross-Pollination
"Cross-Pollination," by Nadine Gordimer, appears in PEN America 2: Home and Away. This talk was originally presented at a Twentieth-Century Masters Tribute to Marcel Proust, sponsored by the PEN American… More
The Invisible Parade
The pleasure that I get from Flannery O’Connor is so intimate that it’s difficult to share. I’ve been trying to think of how to get at her, and it… More
Deranged Punctilio
“I lay inert on the bed and it took three women to put on my trousers. They didn’t seem to take much interest in my private parts, which to… More
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