'Magnificent . . . The man is all here in this book, in this stunning, almost baffling plenitude. Bellow's letters are one of Bellow's greatest books.' - The New York Times Book Reviews

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, three National Book Awards, and the Nobel Prize in Literature, Saul Bellow wrote marvellously acute, unsparing, tender, ferocious, hilarious, and wise letters throughout his long life (1915-2005). Some of the finest letters are to his fellow writers-William Faulkner, John Cheever, John Berryman, Ralph Ellison, Cynthia Ozick, Philip Roth, Martin Amis, and others. Intimate and ironical, rueful and amused, this vast self-portrait-indeed, the autobiography Bellow never wrote-shows the influences at work in the man and illuminates his enduring legacy- the novels and stories that earned him a Nobel Prize and the admiration of readers that world over.

'Stunned with brilliant passages.' - The New Yorker

'Full of those wonderful vignettes that pepper his books, comic and perceptive at the same time.' - The Wall Street Journal

'Feisty, smart, but most of all thrillingly intimate, these letters ripen and mature as they go along.' - Chicago Tribune

'Bellow's sheer brio, his occasional feuds and deep friendships, his unquenchable enthusiasm for being human, and his incomparable prose make this collection an absolute must.' - Financial Times