John Cheever lived at 61 Jane Street when The New Republic published his first short story. His birthday is May 27.

Here are some words from the writer:

Art is the triumph over chaos.

The Stories of John Cheever

I can't write without a reader. It's precisely like a kiss — you can't do it alone.

Christian Science Monitor (October 24, 1979)

He was a tall man with an astonishing and somehow elegant curvature of the spine, formed by an enlarged lower abdomen, which he carried in a stately and contented way, as if it contained money and securities.

Description of a Yankee rector in The Wapshot Scandal

See also: Robert Armitage's "Cheever Country," John Cheever collection of papers, 1942-1982.