Elizabeth “loomed large . . . almost as though she was a character in a novel,” the novelist Anna Quindlen said. “That combination of charm and brilliance, and manners, and steel-trap mind.”40 Students felt there was something formidable about Elizabeth. “You didn’t feel like you were going to be pals with her,” Minot said. In a class full of young people in casual attire, her presence was memorable: a chain-smoker with curled hair, wearing eyeliner and bright lipstick. Her skirts were full, her blouses were neatly pressed, and her shoes were low heels or elegant flats. The novelist Mona Simpson thought Elizabeth’s style gave the impression that she was “too busy to care how she looked but just happened to look great.”41 While some students were put off by her Southern-ness and her critical edge, others found her fascinating. Frances Connell fondly recalled the way Elizabeth would gesture “as if there were an imaginary audience over her shoulder.”42 Sigrid Nunez was surely not alone in being curious about “how she lived, what she ate, and what she did when she wasn’t with us.”43 Because of the fracas around The Dolphin, Elizabeth’s private life had become all too public. In Benedict’s view, this “taught us about the messiness of adulthood and the consolations of literature in the midst of it.”44