Nice read. I find these personal recollections from close friends to be way more illuminating than mere biography. William Feaver's "lives of Lucian Freud" is a

Nice read. I find these personal recollections from close friends to be way more illuminating than mere biography. William Feaver's "lives of Lucian Freud" is also in this vein ;) An influential predecessor to much of Barzun's cultural history was John Erskine's Moral Obligation to be Intelligent. It's a short read. But the quality of prose and clarity of argument is unrivaled! https://archive.org/details/moralobligation00erskgoog https://archive.org/details/moralobligation00erskgoog