“When I finish a sentence, after much labor, it’s finished. A certain point comes at which you can’t do any more work on it because you know it will kill the sentence.”

Stand up, please, place your hand here, state your name clearly. Frederick Charles St. John Vanderveld Montgomery. Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

Our Spring Revel will take place tomorrow, April 3. In anticipation of the event, the Daily is featuring a series of essays celebrating Robert Silvers, who is being honored this year with The Paris Review’s Hadada Prize. “I first met Robert Sil…