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Book Cover for: Letters of John Cheever, John Cheever

Letters of John Cheever

John Cheever

- A revealing self-portrait: In addition to his novels and short stories, John Cheever wrote a prodigious number of letters--sometimes thirty in a week. In The Letters of John Cheever, edited and annotated by his son Benjamin, Cheever reveals his most private thoughts to friends, famous writers, family, and lovers--all of whom he encouraged to discard what he wrote. "Saving letters is like trying to preserve a kiss," he said. As a result, these letters form a story that is even more candid than his journals, and as vivid and human as any he ever invented..

- An intriguing literary icon: Cheever, a complex and contradictory man, "was an adulterer who wrote eloquently in praise of monogamy ... a bisexual who detested any sign of sexual ambiguity." Cheever was a stranger to those closest to him and presented to the world what he thought it wanted to see. These letters display the stark contrast between his ambitions and weaknesses, while tracing his evolution as an artist. .

Book Details

  • Publisher: Simon & Schuster
  • Publish Date: Jul 21st, 2009
  • Pages: 400
  • Language: English
  • Edition: undefined - undefined
  • Dimensions: 9.00in - 6.10in - 1.00in - 1.05lb
  • EAN: 9781439164648
  • Categories: GeneralLiterary Figures

About the Author

Cheever, Benjamin: - Benjamin Cheever, the author of four novels and two works of nonfiction, has also been a newspaper reporter and an editor at Reader's Digest. He lives in Pleasantville, New York, with his wife and sons.
Cheever, John: - John Cheever, novelist, short-story writer, and winner of the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize, was "an American master" (The Boston Globe). He was also a prolofic writer of letters, sending as many as thirty in a week.

More books by John Cheever

Book Cover for: The Stories of John Cheever, John Cheever
Book Cover for: The Wapshot Scandal, John Cheever
Book Cover for: Falconer, John Cheever
Book Cover for: The Journals of John Cheever, John Cheever
Book Cover for: The Wapshot Chronicle, John Cheever
Book Cover for: Fall River and Other Uncollected Stories, John Cheever
Book Cover for: Selected American Short Stories (II), F. Scott Fitzgerald
Book Cover for: John Cheever: Collected Stories and Other Writings (Loa #188), John Cheever
Book Cover for: Oh What a Paradise It Seems, John Cheever
Book Cover for: Bullet Park, John Cheever

Praise for this book

"A special dialogue that touches and haunts...A vivid portrait of the writer." -- Richard Eder, Los Angeles Times
"Wonderfully entertaining.... I felt Cheever's presence in this extraordinary collection. The letters are poignant, stirring one's heart...[and] revealing his perfect honesty about his failings and the frailty of his emotional life." -- The Washington Post Book World
"Fascinating.... love and light irradiate John Cheever's letters....conventional categories quaver before these passionate outpourings of such quantity and intensity." -- New York magazine
"A unique pleasure, one that even biography cannot fully supply -- that of watching an artist discover and refine his world from month to month.... His letters convince us that we are in the presence of both a great writer and a good man." -- Chicago Tribune