SOURCE: A review of Up in the Old Hotel, in Los Angeles Times Book Review, August 16, 1992, pp. 1, 8.

In the following essay, Schulian uses the publication of Up in the Old Hotel as an opportunity to express his long-standing appreciation for Mitchell's work.

Getting hit on the head with a dead cow isn't necessarily a bad thing. Provided, of course, that you survive the experience, it can heighten your appreciation for the absurdities of life as well as for the people who revel in them. For the stalwart bearded lady and the saloon keeper who closes up because the joint's too crowded and the ticket taker who brags that nobody ever got fleas in her Bowery theater. For the homeless Harvard man who imitates sea gulls andthe Gypsies who live on a mixture of gin and Pepsi called "popskull," and the street preacher who says, "The gutter is my...