About the Essays: It is broadness of vision, insight and understanding which, for me, makes Paul’s essays so valuable, instructive and entertaining. They invite us to participate in an intelligent, wide­ranging debate on a whole raft of issues legitimately derived from a consideration of Vance’s creations. I for one am grateful to him for taking critical appreciation of Jack Vance to an altogether higher, more interesting, and more insightful level than ever existed before. Arthur Cunningham I find it quite intriguing that, holding the political and religious opinions he does, Rhoads should have such wonderful insights into Vance…what I have read by him has caused me to appreciate Vance even more than I did though I started to read him some thirty­five years ago. Alain Schremmer Paul has placed Vance in his proper context. He is not merely an exceptional and unique genre writer: he is a Writer of Greatness, who deserves to be mentioned in the context of Cervantes, Ovid, Chaucer and Swift. Steve Sherman Complex, intricate, erudite, involute. Patrick Dusoulier About the Author: Paul Rhoads, editor-in-­chief of the Vance Integral Edition, is a painter from New York who lives in France.