SOURCE: "The Two Faces of Matt Donelson," in The Sewanee Review, Vol. LXXIII, No. 1, Winter, 1965, pp. 106-19.

In the following excerpt, Hanzo examines Garrett's treatment of the human condition in Cold Ground Was My Bed Last Night

George Garrett's stories exhibit [a] kind of concern for the moral predicament, though not for the difficulties or impossibilities inherent in the acceptance of ethical norms. Garrett tells the story in "The Old Army Game" of the tough First Sergeant who is in all of us. Sergeant Quince, who teaches Sachs the stupid game, is the old Nick himself. We go on to the Professor in "My Picture Left in Scotland." He envies the talent of the bright young Jewish student, lusts after the nubile, stupid young thing, and then returns to his house, the slave of an intellectual, slothful woman. The moral ruin is everywhere, from the violence of "Texarkana...