The essays of are articulations of Eva Brann's "vocational" happiness of thinking things through. To Ms. Brann our inalienable right to the pursuit of happiness is the right not to an "endless chase," but rather the right to the actual practice of happiness, as in the "pursuit of a vocation." With essays like "Tips on Reading Homer" and "The Greatness of Great Books" she keeps at her calling: to understand the world around us, and between us, to listen to our inner self-talk, and to consider what comes, perhaps, from beyond us.