For me a page of good prose is where one hears the rain. A page of good prose is when one hears the noise of battle.... A page of good prose seems to me the most serious dialogue that well-informed and intelligent men and women carry on today in their endeavor to make sure that the fires of this planet burn peaceably.

" Cheever's son Benjamin was born on May 4 1948. Cheever spent the summer of 1934 at Yaddo which would serve as a second home for much of his life.

Botolphs in the Wapshot novels) characterized by abiding cultural traditions and a profound sense of community as opposed to the alienating nomadism of modern suburbia. A compilation of his short stories The Stories of John Cheever won the 1979 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and a National Book Critics Circle Award and its first paperback edition won a 1981 National Book Award.