"Our most irresistible literary critic. . . .Much of the fun of reading Mendelsohn is his sense of play, his irreverence and unpredictability, his frank emotional responses. . . .He forces the [essay] form in directions Francis Bacon never imagined." --"The New York Times Book Review" "A scrumptious stylist. . . .He writes better movie criticism than most movie critics, better theatre criticism than most theatre critics and better literary criticism than just about anyone. . .practically every sentence of this book [is] an eye-opener." --"The Guardian" (UK) " Mendelsohn is now, and has been for some time, the finest critic alive. . . . [The essays] proceed from an unparalleled understanding of the Greek and Roman roots of storytelling, which he braids into reviews with a subtlety and patience that is beautiful to behold. . . . A supremely entertaining book." --"Toronto Star" " Mendelsohn's work is absolutely vital in both senses of the word--it breaths with an exciting intelligence often absent in similar but stodgier writing, and it should be required reading for anyone interested in dissecting culture." --"The Daily Beast" " Wide-ranging and absorbing, this new collection of essays from Mendelsohn is a joy from start to finish. . . . A wonderfully eclectic set of musings on the state of contemporary culture and the enduring riches of classical literature." --"Publishers Weekly "(Starred Review) "A throwback. . . to the glorious public intellectuals of former days such as Dwight Macdonald and Robert Warshow. . . . 'Waiting for the Barbarians' adds up to more than the sum of its parts, evidencing an impressive range, depth and nobility of mind." --"San Francisco Chronicle" " No one who these past years has followed the brilliant work of Daniel Mendelsohn in the pages of "The New York Review of Books," "The New Yorker," and "The New York Times Book Review" will be surprised by the extraordinary range of interest this splendid

Daniel Mendelsohn is the author of a memoir, "The Elusive Embrace"; the international best seller "The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million"; a translation of the works of C. P. Cavafy; and a previous collection of essays, "How Beautiful It Is and How Easily It Can Be Broken." He teaches at Bard College.