The Best American essays 1986

Abstract

The follies of writer worship / Julian Barnes -- Not-knowing / Donald Barthelme -- Flight from Byzantium / Joseph Brodsky -- Heatherdown : a late imperialist memoir / Alexander Cockburn -- The passing of jazz's old guard : remembering Charles Mingus, Thelonious Monk, and Sonny Stitt / Gerald Early -- Of accidental judgments and casual slaughters / Kai Erikson -- When the cockroach stood by the mickle wood / Robert Fitzgerald -- China still lifes / William Gass -- Nasty little facts / Stephen Jay Gould -- Dressed to thrill / Anne Hollander -- Morality and foreign policy / George F. Kennan -- On boxing / Joyce Carol Oates -- The first day of school : Washington Square, 1946 / Cynthia Ozick -- The body of Bach / Edward Rothstein -- Visions of the Pacific / Frederick Turner -- On Italo Calvino / Gore Vidal -- Julia / John Wain