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Rachel Cohen Weaves the Kind of Biography That Brings Us Together

Her profoundly imagined stories about encounters between notables of American culture can best be described as a work of wonder. As you read, you may muse about what is made up, and that is where the fun begins.

Via Wikimedia Commons
Norman Mailer, right, with journalist Sakari Määttänen at New York City, 1969. Via Wikimedia Commons
CARL ROLLYSON
CARL ROLLYSON

‘A Chance Meeting: American Encounters’
By Rachel Cohen
NYRB Classics, 416 Pages

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CARL ROLLYSON
CARL ROLLYSON

Mr. Rollyson is the author of The Life of William Faulkner and The Last Days of Sylvia Plath. He has published fourteen biographies and has written about biography for The Wall Street Journal, The Washington, Post, The San Francisco Chronicle, The New Criterion, and other publications.

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