Before publication of By Love Possessed in August 1957 James Gould Cozzens was the least-celebratedliving major American novelist. Despite 12 novels published since 1924 and a Pulitzer Prize for Guard of Honor (1948), Cozzens had achieved neither wide readership nor substantial" critical recognition. His best novels including The Last Adam, Men and Brethren, and The Just and the Unjust which scrutinized professional figures (doctors, lawyers, clergy, soldiers) in a restricted time frame Were stringently anti-sentimental and tightly structured. Moreover, he was a private man who did not participate in the literary life. By Love Possessed focuses on 49 hours in the life of Arthur Winner, Jr., a fifty-four-year-old lawyer in a Delaware Valley town. The principal action is his discovery that his senior partner has embezzled- large amounts from the law firm. COZzens provided a description of his novel that was not used on the dust jacket: "He ends face to...