Volume 3, Number 4 · October 8, 1964
An Ideal Critic
By Steven Marcus
The Living Novel and Later Appreciations
by V.S. Pritchett
Random House, 467 pp., $6.95
The publication of a new collection of essays by V. S. Pritchett serves as a reminder of the degree to which educated readers are in his debt. The present volume combines a welcome reprinting of the thirty-odd essays of The Living Novel, first published in 1947, to which the author has added twenty-seven new pieces, written and published, presumably, during the interim. These pieces, like their predecessors, first appeared in the columns of the New Statesman. Pritchett is not merely a fixture (and director) of this institution; in retrospect, the distinction of its famous 'back of the book' appears, as a practical matter, to be inseparable from the distinction that Pritchett can claim as his own. However imprecise or unfair it may be to both parties, one thinks of the two in the same breath; and both, one may add, have been enhanced by the association.
Review, 3546 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |