To be crazy is not necessarily to writhe in snake pits or converse with imaginary gods. It can sometimes be not knowing what to do in the morning.

One is happy to report that Israel Shenker is still at the aerosol stage. His energy is still compressed. The result distinguishes him both as a Jew and as an observer of Jews.

Even when you disagree with her, she electrifies your mind.

The beginning of a plot is the prompting of desire.

There is no medical proof that television causes brain damage - at least from over five feet away. In fact, TV is probably the least physically harmful of all the narcotics known to man.

In the spirit of Julian Barnes's Flaubert's Parrot and Alain de Botton's How Proust Can Change Your Life, Mr. Dyer's Out of Sheer Rage keeps circling its subject in widening loops and then darting at it when you least expect it . . . a wild book.

There's an enormous difference between being a critic and a reviewer. The reviewer reacts to the experience of that book.