Like Rip Van Winkle returning to his hometown to find that all has changed, Nathan Zuckerman comes back to New York, the city he left eleven years ...
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Mar 17, 2009
Malbadeen
rated it: 
I read it, I said it, I stole your momma's credit....I forget the rest of the rhyme.
*at some point I'm hoping my life calms down enough to actually review this book so I can add my voice to the itsy bitsy pool of people out there reading Roth. I mean come on, the guy deserves an audience for his scribblings and until I share MY opinion, I fear he will not get it. Hold on Roth, hold on!
*at some point I'm hoping my life calms down enough to actually review this book so I can add my voice to the itsy bitsy pool of people out there reading Roth. I mean come on, the guy deserves an audience for his scribblings and until I share MY opinion, I fear he will not get it. Hold on Roth, hold on!
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Dec 31, 2007
Sam
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In characteristic Roth style, the novel is filled with references to the great writers. Joseph Conrad features prominently; Zuckerman and Jamie discuss his novella ‘The Shadow Line’ in depth. E.I. Lonoff is often compared with Bernard Malamud, and a small biographical conundrum in the life of Nathaniel Hawthorne receives rather intense scrutiny. Passing references are made to Isaac B. Singer, Herman Melville, Ernest Hemingway, T.S. Eliot, and William Faulkner. One of Saul Bellow’s novels is ment
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Oct 23, 2007
rachelle
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Phillip Roth is killing Nathan Zuckerman. And he’s doing it in the least humane – but most human – ways: depriving him of his dignity, stripping him of his sexual prowess. Roth, who for much of his career has allowed readers to view Zuckerman as an extension, if not mirror, of himself, toys with this conceit even more obviously in Exit Ghost. Impotent Zuckerman (living an acetic mountain life shared in reality by reclusive Roth) meets a young woman who excites sexual feelings that he’s by now
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Nov 24, 2011
Dusty
rated it: 
So, I know Philip Roth is supposed to be the United States' greatest living novelist and therefore beyond reproach, but I really, really struggled with this book. Thankfully, it was brief (only 300 pages) and so throughout the slow, redundant first half of the book I could remind myself that the end wasn't really that far away. Maybe I'm just not the right audience for a Roth novel. I felt much of the time that I was being lectured to about literature (bad -- I wanted a novel, not a book of lit-
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Oct 23, 2008
Jen
rated it:
With the election around the corner, Exit Ghost struck a nerve with me because it takes place in the weeks around the 2004 election - and in NYC, where the young characters are passionately hoping that Kerry will win.
Nathan Zuckerman is a renowned writer who has lived in isolation in nature for the last 11 years because he started getting death threats in NYC addressed: "Dear Jew Bastard." A prostate cancer survivor, he returns to New York in his 70s for treatment for his i More...
Nathan Zuckerman is a renowned writer who has lived in isolation in nature for the last 11 years because he started getting death threats in NYC addressed: "Dear Jew Bastard." A prostate cancer survivor, he returns to New York in his 70s for treatment for his i More...
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Feb 26, 2008
Renee
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When Nathan Zuckerman returns to Manhattan from his self-imposed rural retreat for the first time in 11 years in Exit Ghost, what does he find? Along with his surprising and unsettling encounters with an aged and ill woman who had once been a young mystery to him, an aggressive biographer who won't take no for an answer, and an alluring young writer who tempts him back into the adventure of seduction, he is confronted with a city whose streets are filled with people behaving quite differently th
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Dec 16, 2009
Casey
rated it:
Almost seems like a follow up to Everyman rather than the ninth Nathan Zuckerman book, but if you've read any of the Zuckerman series then this is a fitting end to those books. It's not a grand epic, that's not what Roth does anyway. It's a brilliant little tale of a reclusive author re-entering society for a brief couple weeks during the Kerry/Bush cat fight. It also has the most graphic descriptions of a man's incontinence and waning physical abilities that I've ever read. If you like that sor
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Oct 08, 2007
David
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This slender, urgent gem from Philip Roth works like a thriller and a literary high-wire act, a wrily pseudo-autobiographical novel that warns against the temptation to draw connections between art and life. All this may not seem so surprising, but it is at once a timeless and timely book (set around the 2004 election, and serving as a portrait of modern day New York and the plague of cell phones) about death and sex, and, therefore, life. It's prime Roth, and a quick ride. And luckily, I feel o
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Jan 03, 2009
Pris
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The Final Chapter, November 30, 2007
"In a Mobius striptease, the disrobing stripper is always on the point of getting dressed again, and there is no resolution to the revelation.
'A Mobius striptease in written form, Philip Roth's new novel, "Exit Ghost," is purportedly his long-running character Nathan Zuckerman's new novel, narrated in the first person. During the course of Nathan Zuckerman's new novel, Zuckerman raises the question of whether an author's personal b More...
"In a Mobius striptease, the disrobing stripper is always on the point of getting dressed again, and there is no resolution to the revelation.
'A Mobius striptease in written form, Philip Roth's new novel, "Exit Ghost," is purportedly his long-running character Nathan Zuckerman's new novel, narrated in the first person. During the course of Nathan Zuckerman's new novel, Zuckerman raises the question of whether an author's personal b More...
Dec 05, 2008
Kathy
rated it: 
If you liked this book, I have some very fine cloth to sell you. It has special properties which make it invisible to the eyes of fools and simpletons. You might want to make a nice sweater out of it. It is very, very expensive, though -- a cloth fit for an emperor.
All right, that's obnoxious of me. But I don't come to this novel as someone who is unfamiliar with Philip Roth (I liked Ghost Writer, loved Goodbye, Columbus and think American Pastoral is almost a masterpiece), and t More...
All right, that's obnoxious of me. But I don't come to this novel as someone who is unfamiliar with Philip Roth (I liked Ghost Writer, loved Goodbye, Columbus and think American Pastoral is almost a masterpiece), and t More...
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Feb 07, 2012
Ben
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I’m a late arrival to the cult of Roth. I read Everyman when that came out in 2006, and then enjoyed American Pastoral. Recently I picked up his 2007 Nathan Zuckerman novel Exit Ghost, along with his next published novel, Indignation. I like his style, though I wonder if he is as profound as some critics have declared him. In recent years we have seen many calling for him to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. It is clear he is a prodigious talent, a man for whom old age seems to hav
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Sep 25, 2011
Христо
rated it:
Филип Рот забърква коктейл от диалогична страст и омраза: http://www.knigolandia.info/2010/01/blog...
Досега не бях чел нищо от Филип Рот, но определено това ще се промени за в бъдеще. Прозата му е лека, приятна, личи си майсторът на словото, а сред случванията той тънко е ефектно прокарва възгледите си.
Неговият герой Цукерман е възрастен саможив писател, който преди 11 години е избягал в усамотена къща в провинцията след заплахи за живота му от неонацистка организация. More...
Досега не бях чел нищо от Филип Рот, но определено това ще се промени за в бъдеще. Прозата му е лека, приятна, личи си майсторът на словото, а сред случванията той тънко е ефектно прокарва възгледите си.
Неговият герой Цукерман е възрастен саможив писател, който преди 11 години е избягал в усамотена къща в провинцията след заплахи за живота му от неонацистка организация. More...
Mar 02, 2011
Dachaublues
rated it:
SPOILERS!
I am still not quite sure whether I like this book or not. However, my opinions shouldn't be taken too seriously as this is the first Zuckerman and first Philip Roth novel I've ever read.
The general prose does not affect me so much; I do not find it grating, nor do I really admire his style. He reminded me at first of Michael Chabon, but sometimes, the tone just strays into something generally unremarkable.
The parts of the book that seem like reflections More...
I am still not quite sure whether I like this book or not. However, my opinions shouldn't be taken too seriously as this is the first Zuckerman and first Philip Roth novel I've ever read.
The general prose does not affect me so much; I do not find it grating, nor do I really admire his style. He reminded me at first of Michael Chabon, but sometimes, the tone just strays into something generally unremarkable.
The parts of the book that seem like reflections More...
Nov 22, 2010
JM
rated it:
It's been my mission to read at least one Philip Roth book all the way through this year. I tried to read "American Pastoral" but got stuck on all the F*ck daddy stuff. This one couldn't have that in it - Nathan Zuckerman is going senile. That's my whole reason for choosing this one next. How much of that dirty old man talk could he include?
Turns out, not so much. He still had to put in that icky dialog, the kind of talk the guys at Linfield college used to say. You know the More...
Turns out, not so much. He still had to put in that icky dialog, the kind of talk the guys at Linfield college used to say. You know the More...
Jan 25, 2010
Stephen
rated it:
What a treat it is to follow the way Roth works on a theme from one book to the next, over the course of his career.
Semi-randomly, I picked this title off the library shelf and was pleased to find that it's a sequel to The Ghost Writer, which I enjoyed just a few weeks ago. It's an unusual sequel in that several decades have passed between the two, both in the fictional timeline and in the writing of them. In the first, the narrator is a randy young fellow just starting his career, w More...
Semi-randomly, I picked this title off the library shelf and was pleased to find that it's a sequel to The Ghost Writer, which I enjoyed just a few weeks ago. It's an unusual sequel in that several decades have passed between the two, both in the fictional timeline and in the writing of them. In the first, the narrator is a randy young fellow just starting his career, w More...
May 28, 2009
Eric
rated it:
I'm no Roth champion, but if there's one thing he can do it's write about Italian food servers. In American Pastoral and Exit Ghost, the two Zuckerman novels I've read, we find Nathan Z in Manhattan spaghetti houses. In Pastoral, while ordering with Swede Levov, Nathan introduces the waiter as "a man you might have imagined lugging around a weightier burden all his life than a plate of ziti". Skip a decade or so ahead to a different Italian place called Peirluigi's where he finds Tony
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Feb 11, 2012
I can tell I already going to love this book. Being someone who is elderly himself, I understand why Roth focuses on the mental and physical problems of the elderly but seeing that I am not an elderly person yet, I cannot say that I can relate to that.
In the book Zuckerman is a loner who escapes NYC in favor of the Berkshires because of death threats and begins to like the freedom of solitude and a life filled with discipline. But when he goes back to the city he feels a counter- More...
In the book Zuckerman is a loner who escapes NYC in favor of the Berkshires because of death threats and begins to like the freedom of solitude and a life filled with discipline. But when he goes back to the city he feels a counter- More...
Oct 14, 2010
bistra
rated it:
Тази книга може би не е най-подходяща за първа среща с Филип Рот, но какво път (оказа се последна от поредицата за героя, алтер его на Рот, Цукерман). Историята нормално не би ми харесала - седемдесетгодишен писател-легенда се завръща в Ню Йорк Сити след 11 години тих уединен живот на майната си, запознава се с нови хора, връща се в миналото и у него всичко в един момент се преобръща и си припомня какво беше това да си Жив. През цялото време ми напомняше на друг голям американски автор на 20 век
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Feb 05, 2009
Veteran novelist Philip Roth labels Exit Ghost the "last ordeal" of his returning fictional narrator Nathan Zuckerman, a character whom critics hailed as one of "the supreme creations of American fiction" (Houston Chronicle). Though some critics found this last chapter of Zuckerman's life powerful and compelling, others thought that the characterand the novellacked focus and that some plot points, particularly Zuckerman's obsession with the decades-younger Jamie, were unc
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May 29, 2009
Richard
rated it:
With the (supposed) last of the Zuckerman books, Roth turns the tables on the once virile (and scallywagolous) hit author - bereft of continence and subsequently of his self-exile, Zuckerman returns to NYC for a procedure to give him back some of his control. What he gets is a loss of control, as his desires for a young female writer are enflamed and he sees Amy, the girl of his dreams (literally) back in The Ghost Writer. We come back to some of the ideas that flashed around the first Zuckerm
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Feb 04, 2009
F.R.
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The Ghost Writer is one of my favourites amongst Roth's work, and so I was really looking forward to this novel which seemed to be a belated sequel (even though there are of course lots of other Zuckerman books.) Having read it, all I can feel is disappointed. I guess mainly because I'm not sure this is really a book at all.
Zuckerman goes to New York and agrees to swap homes with a young literary couple (the wife of whom he becomes infatuated with), he meets up with Amy Belllette - t More...
Zuckerman goes to New York and agrees to swap homes with a young literary couple (the wife of whom he becomes infatuated with), he meets up with Amy Belllette - t More...
Aug 17, 2009
Nancy
rated it:
I never read Philip Roth. I thought he was a "man's" writer and, from the discussions I heard, that he wrote mostly about the fact that young men want to have sex all the time. Which is really not nearly as interesting as young men think it is.
But I picked up this book recently and read it one day, could not put it down. It is the most recent, maybe last book about Roth's protagonist Nathan Zuckerman who the public probably thinks is Roth's alter-ego.
I lo More...
But I picked up this book recently and read it one day, could not put it down. It is the most recent, maybe last book about Roth's protagonist Nathan Zuckerman who the public probably thinks is Roth's alter-ego.
I lo More...
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Nov 27, 2009
Katherine
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"I remembered a New York when the only people walking up Broadway seemingly talking to themselves were crazy. What had happened in these ten years for there suddenly to be so much to say--so much so pressing that it couldn't wait to be said? Everywhere I walked, somebody was approaching me talking on a phone and someone was behind me talking on a phone. When I took a taxi, the cabbie was on the phone. For one who frequently went without talking to anyone for days at a time, I had to wonder
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Jan 24, 2009
Valerie
rated it: 
This book is basically Philip Roth saying that he doesn't want some young punk author coming along to make some money and a name for himself by writing a biography about Roth someday.
The characters are arrogant intellectual snobs. Example on page 85: a female character who is distraught on election night because Bush has defeated Kerry in 2004. "I can't believe it! It's incredible! I'm going out and get an abortion. I don't care if I'm pregnant or not. Get an abortion while you More...
The characters are arrogant intellectual snobs. Example on page 85: a female character who is distraught on election night because Bush has defeated Kerry in 2004. "I can't believe it! It's incredible! I'm going out and get an abortion. I don't care if I'm pregnant or not. Get an abortion while you More...
Feb 18, 2009
matt
rated it:
As I continue on with late era Roth, I can't help but go back to the far from revelatory but astonishingly similarities between his body of work and Woody Allen, America's other famous sex-obsessed, New York centric Jew. "Exit Ghost" finds Zuckerman shaking off the self-imposed exile of the Berkshires and landing himself back into a life that actually requires his participation. Incontinent and impotent, Roth's sinister descriptions of the body's decay provide the book its most hauntin
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Apr 17, 2011
Barb
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I loved Plot Against America - I think about it often and it was unforgettable to me, so I pick up Philip Roth books with great expectations. Nathan Zuckerman returns to NYC after 11 years living as a recluse as the result of threats to his life. He is aging ungracefully, having survived Prostate cancer but become incontinent and impotent. While back, he meets a young couple and fantasizes about a sexual relationship with Jamie (he agrees to swap their apartment for his place in the mountains
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Dec 01, 2008
Anne
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Exit Ghost is Roth's ninth novel featuring writer Nathan Zuckerman. Alas, this is the first one I've read, so I may not have all the background one needs to truly appreciate it. Here, Zuckerman finds himself an elderly man, living in New England, removed from New York's post-9/11 world and on the brink of the 2004 election. Zuckerman returns to his hometown for surgery, but after a brief encounter with the former girlfriend of his now deceased friend, the short story writer E.I. Lonoff, he deci
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Nov 09, 2008
Lori
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This started out strong - Roth is amazing with character development. But I found myself wanting to rush through it to finish it because he started meandering in a way that wasn't meaningful to me. I was interested in lots of the characters although at times I felt a little dumb - maybe not following all the literary references he was making.
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Aug 12, 2009
Steve
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In English class, they tell you to show rather than tell. Roth tells and then tells and then tells, and maybe once every twenty pages shows. The book seems to have no shape or order, and seems a lot like the manuscript that Zuckerman re-wrote four times and decided to, considering what Faulkner would do in such a situation, release it to the public and "let it yield what satisfactions it may."
This was painful to read: Zuckerman rambles and rambles, repeats himself, saying More...
This was painful to read: Zuckerman rambles and rambles, repeats himself, saying More...
Jul 27, 2011
Andrew
rated it:
To say that this is a grim story of an old man’s battle with incontinence, impotence and lust for a much younger woman would be technically correct, but it really doesn’t do this book justice. Nathan Zuckerman (Roth’s alter ego) is the fictional writer Roth has featured in nine of his novels, with this almost certainly being the last. The story follows the excellent The Human Stain as Zuckerman travels back to his native NYC after a prolonged exile in the rural Berkshires. In Manhattan he meets
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