A luminary of American literature, Gilbert Sorrentino (1929 – 2006) was a boyhood friend of Hubert Selby, Jr. and a confidant of William Carlos Williams. He is the author of the classic novels Mulligan Stew and Little Casino and over thirty other books, including A Strange Commonplace, Lunar Follies, The Moon in Its Flight, and The Abyss of Human Illusion. A former editor at Grove Press, Sorrentino taught at Stanford University for many years before returning to his native Brooklyn.