By Measuring Individual Human Worth, The Novelist

Rebecca Goldstein Is A Rare Find Among Contemporary Novelists: She Has Intellectual Muscle As Well As A Tender Emotional Reach.

Let The Guilty Bury The Innocent, And Let No One Change The Evidence

I Apologize For Being Obvious, But Every Time I Watch The Curtain Come Down On Even A Halfway Decent Production Of A Shakespeare Play I Feel A Little Sorrowful That I'll Never Know The Man, Or Any Man Of Such Warm Intelligence.

This Commonplace Cycle Of Falling Asleep And Waking, In Darkness, Under Private Cover, With Another Creature, A Pale Soft Tender Mammal, Putting Faces Together In A Ritual Of Affection, Briefly Settled In The Eternal Necessities Of Warmth, Comfort, Safety, Crossing Limbs To Draw Nearer - A Simple Daily Consolation, Almost Too Obvious, Easy To Forget By Daylight.

It's Good To Get Your Hands Dirty A Bit And To Test How You See Things At A Given Point. And It's Very Pleasing After Writing Something Like 'atonement' Or 'on Chesil Beach,' Which Are Historical, To Get Involved In Some Plausible Re-enactment Of The Here And Now.