Introduction / by David Friend -- One Vanity Fair contrarian fondly recalls another. Dorothy Parker / by Christopher Hitchens -- On poets. W. H. Auden / by Joseph Brodsky -- E. E. Cummings / by Susan Cheever -- Marianne Moore / by Elizabeth Bishop -- On literary lions. Eudora Welty / by Willie Morris -- Reynolds Price / by Anne Tyler -- Saul Bellow / by Martin Amis -- Jack Kerouac / by James Wolcott -- Truman Capote / by Sam Kashner -- Norman Mailer / by Patricia Bosworth -- Ernest Hemingway / by A. Scott Berg -- Tom Wolfe / by Michael Lewis -- Distant shores. Paul Bowles / by Jay McInerney -- Gabriel García Márquez / by Paul Elie -- Primo Levi / by James Atlas -- Naguib Mahfouz / by Christopher Dickey -- Salman Rushdie / by Martin Amis -- Short takes. Willa Cather / by Truman Capote -- James Baldwin / by Jacqueline Woodson -- Roger Straus / by Tom Wolfe -- Ward Just / by David Halberstam -- Toni Morrison / by John Leonard -- Ishmael Beah / by Dave Eggers -- Robert Harris / by Nick Hornby -- Judy Blume / by Meg Wolitzer -- Wole Soyinka / by Nadine Gordimer -- Sonny Mehta / by Dave Eggers -- Christopher Hitchens / by Salman Rushdie -- A family affair. Joan Didion / by Lili Anolik -- John Gregory Dunne / by Dominick Dunne -- Dominick Dunne / by Mike Hogan -- Behind the best-sellers. Josephine Tey / by Francis Wheen -- Grace Metalious / by Michael Callahan -- Mary McCarthy / by Laura Jacobs -- Jacqueline Susann / by Amy Fine Collins -- Cormac McCarthy / by Richard B. Woodward -- Stieg Larsson / by Christopher Hitchens -- James Patterson / by Todd S. Purdum -- Donna Tartt / by Evgenia Peretz -- Memoir. Bosom Buddies / by Laura Z. Hobson -- His Jewish question / by Arthur Miller -- Darkness visible / by William Styron -- A final tale. Kay Thompson / by Marie Brenner.