man of letters

“Literature nowadays is a trade,” Milvain insists: Putting aside men of genius, who may succeed by mere cosmic force, your successful man of letters is your skillful tradesman.

Mallon, a distinguished man of letters, moved to Manhattan at 32, holding a PhD from Harvard and a dissertation that became his acclaimed 1984 book, “A Book of One’s Own.”

In a climate that Mr. Snyder helped create, he billed himself as a businessman rather than as a man of letters.

Indeed, to those who have known only the courtly, controlled man of letters with the encyclopedic knowledge of classical music, the account may come as a shock.

Lives Lived: Paul Johnson, a prolific journalist, biographer and historian prized by conservatives, fashioned himself a man of letters in the great British tradition.