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3.8 AVERAGE
3.8 AVERAGE
Updated: Having reread this, I found Roth's long soliloquies more suffocating than transporting. Rather like taking to Lou about gloves. But because this is Roth I can't stop thinking about this book and its themes. My new theory is that Swede Levov's journey is really that of America itself--the golden boy vs the golden city on the hill. That it wasn't the Swede's blonde good looks, or pageant winning wife, or money, or colonial home that made him American, but his pathological need to repress the pain and betrayal behind a veneer of respectability and banal satisfaction.
The whole book is worth reading for the moment at the end of the book when he takes Dawn's hand. Its everything.
Original review: Oh my God. Wow. This book was so visceral and intense. Roth's book within a book is the perfect approach to examine the fall of the archetypal perfect man. A man brought down not by his own doing, but by his family, his business, and by his country. In essence a man who is destroyed by everything he loves. At times Roth rambling style was so lucid and clear that it utterly transported me, at others is got to be suffocating. But, there was so much going on in this novel that I don't even know where to begin.
The whole book is worth reading for the moment at the end of the book when he takes Dawn's hand. Its everything.
Original review: Oh my God. Wow. This book was so visceral and intense. Roth's book within a book is the perfect approach to examine the fall of the archetypal perfect man. A man brought down not by his own doing, but by his family, his business, and by his country. In essence a man who is destroyed by everything he loves. At times Roth rambling style was so lucid and clear that it utterly transported me, at others is got to be suffocating. But, there was so much going on in this novel that I don't even know where to begin.
"L'ironia è una consolazione della quale non hai proprio bisogno quando tutti ti considerano un dio."
"Per un attimo si era perso d'animo, e quest'uomo che, da quanto potevo indovinare, usava se stesso soprattutto per nascondere se stesso, si era trasformato in un essere impulsivo devitalizzato con un estremo bisogno di conferme."
"Ecco come sappiamo di essere vivi: sbagliando. Forse la cosa migliore sarebbe dimenticare di avere ragione o torto sulla gente e godersi semplicemente la gita."
"Quando la gente muore, l'aggressività svanisce, e persone così piene di difetti che a volte riuscivano quasi insopportabili in vita adesso si presentano nel modo più attraente, e ciò che l'altro ieri ti era meno gradito diventa, nella limousine che segue il carro funebre, una causa non soltanto di indulgente divertimento, ma di ammirazione."
"Lui si considera, comunque, responsabile. Lo ha fatto per tutta la vita, rendendosi innaturalmente responsabile, tenendo sotto controllo non soltanto se stesso ma qualunque altra cosa minacciasse di diventare incontrollabile."
"Ciò che ha fatto è criminale solo nella misura in cui viene definito criminale da uno stato che è esso stesso criminale e pronto a compiere spietate aggressioni in ogni parte del mondo per mantenere l'iniqua distribuzione della ricchezza e difendendo le oppressive istituzioni della classe dominante."
"Perché uno decide, nel bel mezzo delle tue più acute sofferenze, che è venuto il momento di scaricarti addosso, sotto forma di analisi del carattere, il disprezzo che in tutti questi anni ha nutrito per te?"
"La gente è infallibile: sceglie quello che ti manca e poi non te lo dà."
"Per un attimo si era perso d'animo, e quest'uomo che, da quanto potevo indovinare, usava se stesso soprattutto per nascondere se stesso, si era trasformato in un essere impulsivo devitalizzato con un estremo bisogno di conferme."
"Ecco come sappiamo di essere vivi: sbagliando. Forse la cosa migliore sarebbe dimenticare di avere ragione o torto sulla gente e godersi semplicemente la gita."
"Quando la gente muore, l'aggressività svanisce, e persone così piene di difetti che a volte riuscivano quasi insopportabili in vita adesso si presentano nel modo più attraente, e ciò che l'altro ieri ti era meno gradito diventa, nella limousine che segue il carro funebre, una causa non soltanto di indulgente divertimento, ma di ammirazione."
"Lui si considera, comunque, responsabile. Lo ha fatto per tutta la vita, rendendosi innaturalmente responsabile, tenendo sotto controllo non soltanto se stesso ma qualunque altra cosa minacciasse di diventare incontrollabile."
"Ciò che ha fatto è criminale solo nella misura in cui viene definito criminale da uno stato che è esso stesso criminale e pronto a compiere spietate aggressioni in ogni parte del mondo per mantenere l'iniqua distribuzione della ricchezza e difendendo le oppressive istituzioni della classe dominante."
"Perché uno decide, nel bel mezzo delle tue più acute sofferenze, che è venuto il momento di scaricarti addosso, sotto forma di analisi del carattere, il disprezzo che in tutti questi anni ha nutrito per te?"
"La gente è infallibile: sceglie quello che ti manca e poi non te lo dà."
This book shook every foundation of how I view myself and helped me realize we rarely are who we think we are. Loved the book and loved the narrator.
This was a real struggle for me to get through.
I seem to be one of the few people not impressed with this novel. I found the framing of Nathan Zuckerman fictionalizing the story of his idol to weaken the point of the Swede's narrative (maybe it was too meta for me?). The discussions of how Newark changed over time also bothered me - a rising Black population with accompanying riots and neighborhood decay. Was this novel attempting to thoughtfully discuss white-flight or was it just scapegoating the Black residents that were bad workers and ruined the neighborhood of the Jewish and Italian (aka white) immigrants?
Finally, I did not like Roth's (Nathan's?) writing style of multi-page tangents in the middle of actual plot point. The 1997 Atlantic review said is perfectly: "And as we sit with him in the novel's most momentous moment, Roth launches into a long, dense digression on the history of Newark and the leather-glove industry -- a freight of exposition that, for one thing, we've had several times already, and that, occurring at this instant, leaves us dumbstruck."
Finally, I did not like Roth's (Nathan's?) writing style of multi-page tangents in the middle of actual plot point. The 1997 Atlantic review said is perfectly: "And as we sit with him in the novel's most momentous moment, Roth launches into a long, dense digression on the history of Newark and the leather-glove industry -- a freight of exposition that, for one thing, we've had several times already, and that, occurring at this instant, leaves us dumbstruck."
2.25 stars maybe.
Roth certainly is a lovely wordsmith. He has an artful way with the language.
But my god this story is bloated, ponderous, and just generally unenjoyable. Roth's motto must be "why say something with one word when you can use 150, and then repeat it three or four more times..." I found myself skimming paragraphs and skipping entire pages, yet not missing a thing!
On top of it all is a story that's just not terribly compelling or interesting. Pure drudgery. Maybe at the time it was published this was more salacious, but now it just seems run of the mill. The places and characters depicted are not terribly noteworthy or interesting. This was just a big pile of meh.
This was my first foray into the much vaunted Roth. It will also be my last.
Roth certainly is a lovely wordsmith. He has an artful way with the language.
But my god this story is bloated, ponderous, and just generally unenjoyable. Roth's motto must be "why say something with one word when you can use 150, and then repeat it three or four more times..." I found myself skimming paragraphs and skipping entire pages, yet not missing a thing!
On top of it all is a story that's just not terribly compelling or interesting. Pure drudgery. Maybe at the time it was published this was more salacious, but now it just seems run of the mill. The places and characters depicted are not terribly noteworthy or interesting. This was just a big pile of meh.
This was my first foray into the much vaunted Roth. It will also be my last.
I haven't read anything by Roth in many years. I read "Portnoy's complaint" because who didn't. I remember that one of my English professors went to graduate school with him. I know that Roth is a serious author, one of the literary lions. But I just haven't read his books.
This was such a bleak picture of American life. Held me spellbound, but really not what I want to read about, most of the time. It was amazing to watch the Swede's life totally disintegrate.
One of my thoughts, the whole way through the book, was, what is Roth writing now. What would the world of this book have been like if it was written post 9/11. the father Lou was so concerned about the destruction of America in the 70's. The book ends during the impeachment of Nixon. Think about the last 30 years. Even more destruction!
This was such a bleak picture of American life. Held me spellbound, but really not what I want to read about, most of the time. It was amazing to watch the Swede's life totally disintegrate.
One of my thoughts, the whole way through the book, was, what is Roth writing now. What would the world of this book have been like if it was written post 9/11. the father Lou was so concerned about the destruction of America in the 70's. The book ends during the impeachment of Nixon. Think about the last 30 years. Even more destruction!
I just couldn’t love this book. The prose was laborious and the characters didn’t grab me. The story and theme were interesting and there were some really engaging parts. Overall though, not one that I would recommend.
I rarely find reason to rate a book so poorly, but this one truly deserves it. It was a struggle for me to finish and I probably should have tossed it before the halfway point, but I pressed on because i read one too many reviews about how if you gave up on it, you just didn't understand it. Bullshit. I understood it. There's nothing complex here. Its the story of a man who is seemingly living the American dream. A high school star that joins the military just in time for World War Two to end and enjoy the post war prosperity. He marries a beauty queen, inherits a life of better than middle class opulence, only for it to slowly crumble around him in the later years due to societal changes and family events beyond his control. The real problem here is that the author spends massive amounts of time on tangents. There are multiple times in the novel, 20-30 pages at a time, where he goes off explaining the process of making leather gloves from the selection and tanning of the leather to the sewing of it. It's relevant in the sense that the protagonist runs a glove factory, but is completely unnecessary to the story. Same goes for the history of some of the settling of the area the story takes place. It's as if the author feels that because he did a deep dive on the research he has to prove to the reader what he's learned. The fact is even if you cut these tangents out of the book, shaving a third of the books length, you still are left with a boring story filled with internal monologue that just isn't that interesting. 2/5