Introduction: American Audacity
The Problem of the Catholic Novelist
Thinking Things Anew • CYNTHIA OZICK
School of Fish • STANLEY FISH
Death and the Sun • KATIE ROIPHE
Clearer Air • DAVID DENBY
Ideal Critic • LIONEL TRILLING
Why to Read • WENDY LESSER
Living Labyrinth • HAROLD BLOOM
The Tomahawk • JAMES WOLCOTT
Against Dullness • JOSEPH EPSTEIN
Unmaking It • NORMAN PODHORETZ
The Magician • ALLAN GURGANUS
Mockingbird, Incorporated • HARPER LEE
Satan Is a Whaler • MOBY-DICK
Darkness There • EDGAR ALLAN POE
The Hedonist • CARL VAN VECHTEN
Fabled Beyond • DANIEL WOODRELL
Sick in God • CHRISTIAN WIMAN
What We Share • ELIZABETH SPENCER
Only the Mess • PADGETT POWELL
Thrill Me • BARRY HANNAH
Truth to Spirit • LAUREN SLATER
Far from God • DENIS JOHNSON
On Influence • CORMAC MCCARTHY
Fabled Waste • CHILD OF GOD
The Monkey’s Business • FRANCINE PROSE
The Ballad of Mom and Dad • RICHARD FORD