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A review by sdibartola
Herzog by Saul Bellow
4.0
Moses Elkanah Herzog is 47 years old and the son of immigrant Jewish parents from Russia. He’s a professor and author of a modestly successful academic book, “Romanticism and Christianity.” Lately however his life is falling apart. His manipulative second wife Madeleine has taken up with his best friend Valentine Gerspach, and he’s an absentee parent to his son Marco by first wife Daisy and to his daughter June by Madeleine.
“Herzog” the novel won the National Book Award when it was published in 1964. It is written primarily in the third person, but episodically reverts to first person narration. As he tries to make sense of his life, Herzog resorts to writing letters (often unfinished and always unsent) to various people – family and friends, associates and strangers, and famous people from history. We see only Herzog’s view – his complaints about the people in his life – but we don’t see what they think of him. Author Jeffrey Eugenides calls “Herzog” a “self-reflexive epistolary novel.” Herzog is trying to regain balance, and the letter writing seems to facilitate the healing process. It’s a way to work through the problems of his life and modern society. Some have called it a “novel of redemption,” but I’m not sure that’s the case. It renders a rather harsh judgment on the contemporary world of the 1960’s. In some respects, the novel reminds me of “A Serious Man,” the 2009 film written, produced, and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. In the movie, college professor Larry Gopnik finds his life unraveling as his wife Judith empties his bank account and seeks a divorce to move in with Sy Ableman, whose personality resembles that of Valentine Gersbach in the novel.
The women in Herzog’s life are variably portrayed. We don’t learn much at all about Daisy. Madeleine seems to be a psychopath (or at least a sociopath). The New York City shopkeeper Ramona is compassionately drawn. She’s just doing her best to make ends meet and find a meaningful relationship in middle age. Herzog doesn’t give her the consideration she seems to deserve. He’s too preoccupied with himself and his hatred of Madeleine.
In New York City, while waiting in the courthouse to meet his lawyer and discuss custody of June, Herzog stumbles upon a number of hearings that illustrate the ugliness of life. In one example, a young woman is on trial for the death of her 3-year-old son. He died from a ruptured liver after she threw him against the wall while her boyfriend watched from the bed where he was smoking a cigarette. The story makes Herzog physically sick. Referring to himself, he says: “this is the difficulty with people who spend their lives in humane studies and therefore imagine once cruelty has been described in books it is ended.” What is the emotional suffering of Herzog in comparison to this kind of horrific event? And what about global events of destruction and genocide like Hiroshima and the Holocaust? As Theodore Solotaroff says in his review “Napoleon Street and After,” “War and genocide have reduced the sacredness of the individual life.”
“Herzog” the novel won the National Book Award when it was published in 1964. It is written primarily in the third person, but episodically reverts to first person narration. As he tries to make sense of his life, Herzog resorts to writing letters (often unfinished and always unsent) to various people – family and friends, associates and strangers, and famous people from history. We see only Herzog’s view – his complaints about the people in his life – but we don’t see what they think of him. Author Jeffrey Eugenides calls “Herzog” a “self-reflexive epistolary novel.” Herzog is trying to regain balance, and the letter writing seems to facilitate the healing process. It’s a way to work through the problems of his life and modern society. Some have called it a “novel of redemption,” but I’m not sure that’s the case. It renders a rather harsh judgment on the contemporary world of the 1960’s. In some respects, the novel reminds me of “A Serious Man,” the 2009 film written, produced, and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. In the movie, college professor Larry Gopnik finds his life unraveling as his wife Judith empties his bank account and seeks a divorce to move in with Sy Ableman, whose personality resembles that of Valentine Gersbach in the novel.
The women in Herzog’s life are variably portrayed. We don’t learn much at all about Daisy. Madeleine seems to be a psychopath (or at least a sociopath). The New York City shopkeeper Ramona is compassionately drawn. She’s just doing her best to make ends meet and find a meaningful relationship in middle age. Herzog doesn’t give her the consideration she seems to deserve. He’s too preoccupied with himself and his hatred of Madeleine.
In New York City, while waiting in the courthouse to meet his lawyer and discuss custody of June, Herzog stumbles upon a number of hearings that illustrate the ugliness of life. In one example, a young woman is on trial for the death of her 3-year-old son. He died from a ruptured liver after she threw him against the wall while her boyfriend watched from the bed where he was smoking a cigarette. The story makes Herzog physically sick. Referring to himself, he says: “this is the difficulty with people who spend their lives in humane studies and therefore imagine once cruelty has been described in books it is ended.” What is the emotional suffering of Herzog in comparison to this kind of horrific event? And what about global events of destruction and genocide like Hiroshima and the Holocaust? As Theodore Solotaroff says in his review “Napoleon Street and After,” “War and genocide have reduced the sacredness of the individual life.”