Despite the title, not all the pieces [in "Bachelorhood: Tales of the Metropolis"] are about bachelorhood (of which Lopate, though once married for five years, is evidently a born practitioner), nor are they all, strictly speaking, about the metropolis. But they are all about Lopate's bacheloric and city-boy personality, one of complex charm and exceptional intelligence, wittiness and talent.

Lopate is as gifted at catching thoughts as he is at showing behavior and sensation. Whether in the energetic and sophisticated survey "Bachelorhood and Its Literature," in the wonderfully sharp (but not condescending) social study "Quiche Blight on Columbus Avenue," or the definitely sensible "Renewing Sodom and Gomorrah," which concerns pornography, Lopate's thinking is as involving as the personal accounts of his experiments with human connection.

His approach to human connection, combining as it does eagerness and restraint, is entertaining to read about—entertaining in the way that any...