CORRESPONDENCE

To the Editor:

When Douglas Brinkley (Book Review, Oct. 8), identified in his contributor’s note as a Professor of History, observes that Thomas Wolfe, rejecting the modernism of Joyce and Eliot, embraced instead “19th century Romanticism as exemplified in the works of Henry Fielding,” (1707-1754); and then goes on to identify Robert Penn Warren as the one who “launched the Kenyon Review” (it was John Crowe Ransom who edited that journal from its inception until his retirement), readers must feel entitled to regard Professor Brinkley’s casual judgments--”the forgettable Caroline Gordon,” “the pious Tate,” “the overrated Jack Kerouac”--with considerable reserve.

Anthony Hecht

Washington, D.C.