Malamud, Teacher

"In this closely written biography, Philip Davis emphasises those human concerns central in Malamud, whose name means teacher: his 'was the ability to create – in place of abstract thought – that anterior mass of dense and confused human feeling, which thoughts themselves came out of'."

- Christopher Hawtree reviews a new Malamud biography. The above, by the way, is practically the only part of the review that mentions the book; the rest is a potted life of the writer.)