In Art & Ardor, Ozick's perfectionist, self-critical habits produce a book which surprises and delights on every line, a model—except that her prose is inimitable—of the play of mind over matters of life and literature….

Cynthia Ozick puts everything she has into her essays—and that's a lot: wit, fierce intelligence, supple writing, and an absence of hackneyed opinion. Her subjects include literature, Judaism, feminism. Beginning one of her essays, you don't know where it will end up or what strange points she will make along the way. An essay on Truman Capote produces an ironic reminiscence of studying literature at NYU in the post-war years, along with unappreciative Army vets….

Ozick's positions are unequivocal and often unfashionable. She dislikes the new feminism which celebrates women's separateness. A "classic" feminist herself, she hates the term "woman writer" and opposes the idea of a female nature, calling it...