A Line Out For a Walk

“[His] way with the familiar essay―that flexible, forgiving genre in which anything goes except charmlessness and anonymity―has much in common with that of Messrs, Beerbohm, Liebling, and Mencken. Each piece is exquisitely sustained, moving from point to point with the relaxed economy of a pro.” ― Wall Street Journal Paul Klee’s words on his art, “I take a line out for a walk,” describe precisely what the author of these essays does―he takes out such “lines” as gossip, gambling, height (or the lack of it), hats, smoking, fame or compulsive reading and “walks them” in his own discursive style.