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A review by markfullmer
Portnoy's Complaint by Philip Roth
3.0
After a friend jokingly suggested recommending this marathon of a psychosexual rant to difficult students, I decided I might as well foist it on myself.
The conceit of the book is that the narrator, Alexander Portnoy, is talking to his psychotherapist, but it really just ends up being one long monologue of the narrator's life in a style that you'll appreciate if you like yiddish kvetching, featuring such detailed descriptions as the lovely bowel movements of the narrator's costive papa, and the lovely private parts of the narrator's mama, and a chapter devoted to the narrator's discovery of onanism--with a particularly memorable recounting of his deflowering of a cut of liver.
The conceit of the book is that the narrator, Alexander Portnoy, is talking to his psychotherapist, but it really just ends up being one long monologue of the narrator's life in a style that you'll appreciate if you like yiddish kvetching, featuring such detailed descriptions as the lovely bowel movements of the narrator's costive papa, and the lovely private parts of the narrator's mama, and a chapter devoted to the narrator's discovery of onanism--with a particularly memorable recounting of his deflowering of a cut of liver.