Miss Porter has no genius but much talent. Her average level is high, and she doesn't let you down. She is more fundamentally serious than Katherine Mansfield, less neurotic, closer to the earth. She is dry-eyed, even in tragedy: when she jokes, she does not smile. You feel you can trust her. (p. 312)

I liked "Noon Wine" best of [the stories in Pale Horse, Pale Rider]. It is an examination of "the nature of a crime," a subtle, psychological theme handled so directly, so concretely that one is reminded of de Maupassant…. Only an exceedingly skilled writer could have presented the … tragedy so vividly and with such absolute conviction. The characterization is beautifully done, and the farm really comes to life, with all its sounds and smells….

The work of so important an artist as Miss Porter must be judged by the lowest, as well as the highest standards—and, curiously enough, it is by the lowest standards that she fails. She is grave, she is delicate, she is just—but she lacks altogether, for me personally, the vulgar appeal. I cannot imagine that she would ever make me cry, or laugh aloud. No doubt, she would reply that she doesn't want to. But she should want to. I wish she would give herself a little more freely to the reader. I wish she would paint with bolder, broader strokes. I wish she wouldn't be quite so cautious. (p. 313)