Dictation, the latest work of fiction from Cynthia Ozick, brings together four long stories that showcase her sly humor and piercing insight into the human heart. The title story imagines a fateful meeting between the secretaries to Henry James and Joseph Conrad at the peak of their fame. Timid Miss Hallowes, who types for Conrad, comes under the influence of Jame's Miss Bosanquet, high-spirited, flirtatious, and scheming. In a masterstroke of genius, Ozick hatches a plot between them to insert themselves into literary posterity.
Each story in the collection starts in the comic mode, with heroes who suffer from willful self-deceit. From self-deception, these not-so-innocents proceed to deceive others, who don't take it lightly. Revenge is the consequence - and for the reader, a delicious if dark recognition of emotional truth.