Occasional Prose

**Reading and romance, gardening tips, a farewell to a friend, even an opera retold make up this stellar collection from the bestselling author of The Group and Memories of a Catholic Girlhood

This intriguing nonfiction collection by Mary McCarthy is a cornucopia of literary delights that challenges the mind and captivates the senses.

“On Rereading a Favorite Book” is McCarthy’s reaction to returning to Tolstoy’s *Anna Karenina *after more than thirty years. In “Politics and the Novel,” she shatters a myth about the American versus European style of storytelling. Acts of reading, when consummated, are akin to “Acts of Love.” And “Saying Good-bye to Hannah” is a poignant farewell to the author of *The Human Condition *and, in particular, *The Life of the Mind, *the book Hannah Arendt saw as her crowning achievement.

Whether giving us the story of *La Traviata *in her own words or reviewing a charming and practical book on gardening, McCarthy imbues *Occasional Prose *with her powerful sense of time and place. Uninhibited and uncensored, it filters the world through her unique gifts of observation and novelist’s masterful eye for detail. This is a book for anyone interested in the life of the mind—and heart.  

This ebook features an illustrated biography of Mary McCarthy including rare images from the author’s estate.