Volume 20, Number 6 · April 19, 1973
O'Hara, Cheever & Updike
By Alfred Kazin
John O'Hara nursed his grudges with the acumen of a Balzac hero. The more he published and the richer he became, the more he identified himself with the lonely grandeur of the underrated. He published so many books that he virtually ran out of titles—his short story collections were getting called Assembly, The O'Hara Generation, And Other Stories. By the time he died in the spring of 1970, he had published more than thirty books, over 250 short stories, and he was full of riches—his own riches and the lore of the American rich. He now helped them to find names for their race-horses. He was a conspicuous and angry success who in print enumerated the number of cars in his garage with as much passion as he did the number of stories he had written. He even had the square body, totally wary face, and somehow arranged look of propriety that used to be the mark of American managers of industry who had made their way up—seemingly with the force of their faces.
Feature, 3637 words
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