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5 reviews for:
Philip Roth: Zuckerman Bound A Trilogy and Epilogue 1979-1985
Philip Roth, Ross Miller
4.17 AVERAGE
5 reviews for:
Philip Roth: Zuckerman Bound A Trilogy and Epilogue 1979-1985
Philip Roth, Ross Miller
4.17 AVERAGE
Don't really know what to think about this. In some ways, I feel like it got worse as it went on, these four novels.
The first one was interesting and bizarre, and all four have something similar. Lots of strangeness wrapped up in the mundane, with manic monologues that vacillate between Jewish identity and pornography, and almost those two subjects exclusively. Which, at first, is interesting, in its own way. But as it goes on...and on and on...the bit wears thin, if you get me.
The novels are just strange, though. They're essentially plotless and happen over a very short time frame, but are primarily happening in the neurotic mind of Nathan Zuckerman. His obsessions fill every page, but his obsessions are almost exclusively the things that make him horny and his own career as a writer and how this reflects upon his Jewishness and Jewish identity.
I think the main problem is that two of these four novels are essentially about the struggles of being a famous writer. Which is...well, it's something. The metafictional aspects are quite interesting, in their own way, since he's sort of writing distorted autobiographies reflecting upon his own fame as a young writer and the critical and cultural response to his novels and how they reflect upon his Jewishness and Jewish identity more broadly.
I think there's maybe just too much of this, though. Too much living inside Zuckerman's neurotic, horny, bitter, self-absorbed mind.
I really just don't know what to think of it all. It's sometimes great, sometimes tedious, sometimes entirely bizarre.
It's possible I'd have liked this more had I not read Bukowski or any such similar writers. Interesting, too, how many novels written lately, that I've read, seem to owe so much to Roth, even if they never read these novels.
I do still think there are more Roth novels I'll try out. The Plot Against America for one, and then some of his award winning novels. Some of them are even Zuckerman novels! There's a bit of a sourness in my mouth over these Roth novels, but such an esteemed writer must have something going for him, yes?
We'll see when I return to all this though.
The first one was interesting and bizarre, and all four have something similar. Lots of strangeness wrapped up in the mundane, with manic monologues that vacillate between Jewish identity and pornography, and almost those two subjects exclusively. Which, at first, is interesting, in its own way. But as it goes on...and on and on...the bit wears thin, if you get me.
The novels are just strange, though. They're essentially plotless and happen over a very short time frame, but are primarily happening in the neurotic mind of Nathan Zuckerman. His obsessions fill every page, but his obsessions are almost exclusively the things that make him horny and his own career as a writer and how this reflects upon his Jewishness and Jewish identity.
I think the main problem is that two of these four novels are essentially about the struggles of being a famous writer. Which is...well, it's something. The metafictional aspects are quite interesting, in their own way, since he's sort of writing distorted autobiographies reflecting upon his own fame as a young writer and the critical and cultural response to his novels and how they reflect upon his Jewishness and Jewish identity more broadly.
I think there's maybe just too much of this, though. Too much living inside Zuckerman's neurotic, horny, bitter, self-absorbed mind.
I really just don't know what to think of it all. It's sometimes great, sometimes tedious, sometimes entirely bizarre.
It's possible I'd have liked this more had I not read Bukowski or any such similar writers. Interesting, too, how many novels written lately, that I've read, seem to owe so much to Roth, even if they never read these novels.
I do still think there are more Roth novels I'll try out. The Plot Against America for one, and then some of his award winning novels. Some of them are even Zuckerman novels! There's a bit of a sourness in my mouth over these Roth novels, but such an esteemed writer must have something going for him, yes?
We'll see when I return to all this though.
Whew. This book (which is actually three novels and a novella) is very very long. Nathan Zuckerman is (in The Ghost Writer) a young novelist having dinner at the home of his idol; (in Zuckerman Unbound) an author who suddenly becomes famous and rich at the expense of exposing family secrets and implicating himself in sexual escapades; (in The Anatomy Lesson a jaded author who can no longer write and is plagued by uncurable pain and a lack of ideas; and (in "The Prague Orgy") a famous American writer who goes behind the Iron Curtain in search of some lost Yiddish manuscripts. I think the books together are better than any of the books individually, and I'm quite glad I dipped into Zuckerman's world even though he is a difficult man to like. Roth extended this trilogy and I'd like to read more, after I have a little break from all Zuckerman all the time...
Otro asalto al mundo de la significación que degenera en fracaso, y esta vez en el tiempo récord de cuarenta y ocho horas.
Excellent writing in the service of a bland, indulgent, self-centered stories. With the exception of The Ghost Writer, it's hard to call any of it a story at all, it's just a man who has a series of near-revelations, a few of which manage to penetrate, none of which seem to carry forward to the next book. To read this collection is like watching webisodes for a TV show you've never seen; every once in a while you get the feeling that there might be something to this, but all of the action takes place in-between the parts you get to see.
The prose, though, is phenomenal.
The prose, though, is phenomenal.