GOD, MAN AND BOOK REVIEWS

I read the Book of Job, in the King James version, for the mighty sound of its English, much as Lord Peter Wimsey recited Homer’s “Catalogue of Ships” in classic Greek to awe some superstitious peasants.

It is absurd, albeit a good move on the part of William Safire to make the connections God / Job, Nixon / Safire (“The First Dissident: The Book of Job in Today’s Politics,” reviewed by Jack Miles, Dec. 20).

Which book--”Job” or “Dissident”--is the more far-fetched it would be hard to say. But if I do not know who wrote “Job,” I do know who wrote speeches for a man from whom he should have recoiled long before Watergate.

FRED SCIFERS, DOWNEY