The Selected Letters of D. H. Lawrence (The Cambridge Edition of the Letters of D. H. Lawrence)

This is another good book to have at your desk for those between-chapter breaks: flip it open and read from this distillation of over 300 letters written by D. H. Lawrence. There are letters to lords and ladies, culture barons, chambermaids and pals, discoursing widely on Whitman, wilderness ("the big old pagan cosmos"), German gingerbread, and Mexican railways--the selections are fun and lively, and they illuminate an era. Plus, his political predictions tend to be right on the money: "Chaos," Lawrence writes, "is necessary for Russia." For the peripatetic author, too: Lawrence never stayed in one place too long. The better to keep up the letters.