Volume 33, Number 11 · June 26, 1986
A Hero of Our Own Times
By Denis Donoghue
A Man of Letters: Selected Essays
by V.S. Pritchett
Random House, 305 pp., $19.95
In 1939 V.S. Pritchett set about reading many novels in the hope of discovering what was wrong with the one he was trying to write. He didn't regard himself as a critic, but as an ordinary reader with a private ax to grind. Taking notes on his reading, he started publishing pieces in the New Statesman. Paper was scarce, so he had to restrict himself to short essays of about 1800 words, an exigency from which he developed the laconic and allusive style he continues to practice in the more spacious conditions of The New Yorker and The New York Review of Books.
Review, 3434 words
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