Remembering Irving Howe

It is very difficult to write about someone much celebrated, much admired, much mourned. I will content myself with this small anecdote.

A good friend was visiting one day when the mail came, bringing a letter from Irving in which he praised in lovely words a book manuscript I had shown him. I passed the letter over to my friend. “My God!” he said. “From Irving Howe! You must be ecstatic.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” I said. “When you ge...