We call it "literature" because it has something important to tell us, but it can be difficult to fully grasp the messages found in great books. A psychoanalyst as well as a professor of literature, Josh Cohen invites us to contemplate profound questions about the human experience by focusing on some of the best-known characters in fiction, including Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway, Lewis Carroll's Alice, and Harper Lee's Scout Finch. Finding unexpected connections, Cohen explores the works of George Eliot, James Baldwin, Muriel Spark, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Marilynne Robinson, among others.