A recent Telegram & Gazette profile echoes the national praise that Leah Hager Cohen, the Jenks Chair of Contemporary American Letters at the College of the Holy Cross, received for her fourth novel The Grief of Others. Since its publication in September, the overwhelmingly successful novel has been chosen as Oprah’s Book of the Week, and has been honored on numerous national booklists, including Kirkus Review’s Top 25 Fiction Books of 2011, The New York Times’ 100 Notable Books of 2011, and the Washington Post’s Notable Fiction of 2011.
Although very humble about her success, Cohen shared with the reporter, “I actually do care a lot about people whose opinion I respect. When I hear from people I think of as really good thinkers and writers and cultural critics it does mean a lot to me to think that this book, that my writing, in some way feels satisfying and worthy of reckoning with in those circles. That feels real to me and that feels like a nourishing kind of praise as opposed to that sort of butter crème icing kind of praise that tastes good and then you sort of feel a little bit sick after you eat it.”
This “Holy Cross in the News” item is by Sara Bovat ’14.