An updated edition with six new essays, including "An Evening at Shea" and "Remembering Beckett," as well as two long interviews from "one of America's greats" (Time Out Chicago) The celebrated author ofInvisible,The New York Trilogy, andThe Book of Illusionspresents a highly personal collection of essays, prefaces, true stories, autobiographical writings (including the seminal workThe Invention of Solitude), and collaborations with artists, as well as occasional pieces written for magazines and newspapers. Ranging in subject from Sir Walter Raleigh to Kafka, Nathaniel Hawthorne to the high-wire artist Philippe Petit, conceptual artist Sophie Calle to Auster's own typewriter, the World Trade Center catastrophe to his beloved New York City itself,Collected Proserecords the passions and insights of a writer who "will be remembered as one of the great writers of our time" (San Francisco Chronicle). Paul Austeris the author of eleven novels, most recentlyOracle Night. His previous two novels,The Book of IllusionsandTimbuktu, were national bestsellers. He lives in Brooklyn, New York. The celebrated author of theNew York Trilogy,The Book of Illusions, andOracle Nightpresents a highly personal selection of his essays, prefaces, true stories, autobiographical writings, and collaborations with artists, as well as occasional pieces written for magazines and newspapers, includingThe Invention of Solitude, his "breathtaking memoir" (Financial Times Magazine, London). Ranging in subject from Sir Walter Raleigh to Kafka, Nathaniel Hawthorne to the high-wire artist Philippe Petit, conceptual artist Sophie Calle to Auster's own typewriter, the World Trade Center catastrophe to his beloved New York City itself,Collected Proserecords the passions and insights of a man who "will be remembered as one of the great writers of our time" (San Francisco Chronicle). "[Auster] has assembled his youthful [nonfiction] in one stout, handsome silo . . . Seeing the pieces together, you realize they are the work that allowed Auster to see himself as a Writer with a capital 'W.' It's rare these days for a novelist to admit to this desire without mocking it, which explains why Auster has remained the drug of choice for readers who once would have chosen Vonnegut. He read, he wrote, and he hungered.Collected Prosewould feel like a tombstone to that time if [Auster] didn't do these things so fervently still."--John Freeman,Dallas Morning News "Auster'sCollected Proseprovides a fascinating long-exposure snapshot of a writer's private and abiding obsessions and touchstones as he oscillates between the worlds of his life and art."--The Times(London) "Absorbing . . . [Auster's] informed enthusiasms, especially for European modernism and aspects of the avant-garde, make him a passionate, intelligent, and stimulating commentator. He writes acutely about the dilemmas which inform serious artistic decisions. These hospitable, generous pieces make one want to go immediately to the writers he discusses."--Robert Potts,The Guardian(London) "[Paul Auster] has assembled his youthful [nonfiction] in one stout, handsome silo . . . The pieces [inCollected Prose] deserve this mid-career dais. Like fellow Brooklynites Jonathan Lethem and Colson Whitehead, Mr. Auster is a fanatic, but of an earlier generation. So while Mr. Lethem and Mr. Whitehead are specialists in comic books and television, Mr. Auster is head over heels for symbolist French poetry, New Wave cinema, and surrealist theatre. Whereas another writer might try to breathe such work to life with gusts of pretension, Mr. Auster a