often speaks in first person while offering personal accounts and memories revolving around the plot. Furthermore, Gould's nonexistent “Oral History” is an attempt to capture the voices of the plebeian class, or the anti-heroes. Mitchell's entire work, especially Joe Gould’s Secret, captures the selfsame essence. His work often revolves around character study, in which he captures Joe Gould's profile. Gould struggles with writing and rewriting the first few chapters of his “Oral History” because of writer's block. Ironically, Mitchell, himself, is struggling with a degree of writer's block in which he was unable, later in life, to continue his previous writing output. Critical reception Critical reviews of Mitchell's works are, almost overwhelmingly, positive. Many critics have labeled Mitchell "the best reporter in the country" and marked him as the writer with whom "any writer with aspirations in literary journalism...has to reckon with," and the writer that "transform[ed] the craft of reporting into art". William Zinsser states that Mitchell serves as the "primary textbook" for "nonfiction writers of any generation". Critics credit Mitchell's strength as a writer to his "skills as an interviewer, photographic representation of his characters and their speech, deadpan humor, and graceful, unadorned prose style". Critics also note that it is Mitchell's "respect and compassion for his subjects" that allows him to explore uncomfortable themes like "mortality, change, and the past". Throughout Mitchell's career, he has been praised for his "ear for dialogue and eye for detail, genuine interest in the lives of his subjects, rhythmic, simple prose". For many critics, Mitchell serves as the model writer for "generations of nonfiction writers" In the latter part of Mitchell's career, critics began to note that the tone of his writing had become "increasingly nostalgic" but that he retained his "earthly sense of humor and obvious delight in making new discoveries about New York". One notable literary critic, Noel Perrin, notes that "Mitchell described the life and even the very soul of New York as perhaps no one else ever has". There are critics who question Mitchell's legacy as a journalist because of his tendency to "cross a line" between fiction and nonfiction, often "shaping the facts" of his stories to offer "the core 'truth' of the story" rather than "its interior factuality". One critic asks, "knowing [Mitchell] fabricated and embellished, how should we view his legacy?" In popular culture In 2000, Joe Gould's Secret, a feature film directed by