The spiritual dandy

the long version

Cates is back with a fourth book about the travails of being a dandy in a world run by spirituals. A dandy, as defined in previous books, is a person who is not naturally spiritual. This time he exudes more hope than he has in past collections of essays (called papers in previous volumes). As he struggles to contain the schizophrenia that has closed so many doors to him, he communes with God and seeks answers to spiritual questions that have heretofore been unknown and unknowable for him. He speaks poignantly of a childhood in which he did not progress through stages crucial to achieving true manhood. But he rejects the paranoia that has gripped him in the past, asserting that one cannot be paranoid if one knows no fear. Perhaps he had no choice when he took the "road less traveled," but he has learned to embrace the circumstances and to use them for his benefit. -- back cover.