The Journals of John Cheever

By John Cheever and Robert Gottlieb

In these journals, the experiences of one of the most renowned twentieth-century American writers come to life with fascinating, wholly revealing detail. • "A treasure-trove of riches." —The New York Times Book Review

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author's journals provide peerless insights into the creation of his novels and stories. But they are equally the record of a complex, often dark, always closely observed inner world. No American writer of comparable stature has left such an unreservedly revealing and moving account of himself: his family life, his literary life, and his emotional life.

The final word from one of modern America's great writers, The Journals of John Cheever provides a powerful and beautiful capstone to a towering oeuvre.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Oct 5, 2011
• ISBN: 9780307790293

John Cheever

John Cheever, best known for his short stories dealing with upper-middle-class suburban life, was born in Quincy, Massachusetts, in 1912. Cheever published his first short story at the age of seventeen. He was the recipient of a 1951 Guggenheim Fellowship and winner of a National Book Award for The Wapshot Chronicle in 1958, the 1979 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for The Stories of John Cheever, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and an American Book Award. He died in 1982, at the age of seventy.

Reviews for The Journals of John Cheever

[cliffburns · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Cheever's JOURNALS are gorgeously composed, trial runs for the short stories and novels he so meticulously constructed. The words pour out of him, startling, candid observations of the world surrounding him rendered in peerless prose. A book for careful, scrupulous readers, folks who enjoy reading poetry slowly, savoring each syllable or inflection.

[simondagut · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Compulsive reading. The effect is as if one is being allowed complete access to Cheever's consciousness (and parts of his unconcious too, in the unforgettable dream descriptions.) Usually sad and frequently hilarious. And, of course, beautiful.