Fiction Paris, 1959 by David Plante. A nineteen-year-old American boy was on a French ship, sailing from America to Europe in 1959--his first trip abroad. He didn't speak French very well, but tried to speak to some of the friendly passengers. He wanted to meet everyone and danced with several different women. He...

Our Footloose Correspondents THE LAST WALTZ CLOG, THE FIRST CAROMBOLA by James Stevenson. OUR REGIONAL CORRESPONDENTS about taking tap dance and jai alai lessons. The writer, who describes himself as fifty-three years old and two hundred and fourteen pounds, asks his friend Frank (a somewhat flabby, heavy-smoking sexagenarian) if he wants to take tap-dancing lessons with him. They arrive a...

Books by John Updike.

Musical Events by Andrew Porter.

The Talk of the Town Danny Boy's by Nancy Ramsey. Talk story about the farewell party at Danny Boy's, an Irish pub on Second Avenue. "Tastings by 2," a fine-wine-by-the glass-establishment, is taking over. In the back room, writer talked to Bill McGowan, the proprietor of Danny Boy's for fifteen years. He used to be a...

Books by John Updike. Entire column is an essay about Ralph Waldo Emerson...

The Talk of the Town Qwerty by William McKibben. Two-part Talk story about typewriting. Writer attended a a function at Tavern-on-the-Green last month, at which Smith Corona introduced WordEraser, a feature found only on new, top-of-the-line Smith-Corona electric typewriters. Paul Retter, a marketing manager, explained that if you want to erase...

Fiction In the White Night by Ann Beattie. Matt and Gaye Brinkley had been married for 25 years. Their best friends were Carol and Vernon, who had been married 22. The Brinkleys gave a book party for a friend, and everyone played "The-Don't-Think-About-Whatever game." Matt and Gaye had a daughter named Becky, who had...

Annals of Medicine THE HOOFBEATS OF A ZEBRA by Berton Roueche. ANNALS OF MEDICINE about an undiagnosed case of myasthenia gravis. The patient was Sheila Allen, and the writer begins her story on the afternoon of October 11, 1978, when, at age 24, she asked to be admitted to Alvarado Community Hospital, in San Diego, California, for psychiatric help. On October...

The Talk of the Town Guides by James Lardner. Two-part Talk story about the United Nations. The first part is about a 20-year reunion of United Nations tour guides. In 1964, the number of U.N. guides swelled to its historic high, 115, thanks to the New York World's Fair. It was also a time of blossoming idealism...

Dancing by Arlene Croce.

Comment by John Updike. Simone de Beauvoir, on the most recent of her infrequent visits to this city, told an interviewer in the Times Book Review, "There are very few drugstores left. Thirty years ago, I often had lunch in a drugstore. I'd go sit at a counter and order coffee and a sandwich...

Poetry Mea Culpa by Patricia Goedicke. Whether it is the President of the United States...

Poetry Wisteria by Philip Levine. The first purple wisteria...