American Pastoral in Around the World in 80 Books

Oct 17, 2014 Steve rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

As I neared the end of Philip Roth’s American Pastoral, I couldn’t help but recall Henry James’s tag about Russian novels being “loose and baggy monsters,” and how I might apply that description to Roth’s effort. This is my third Roth (Goodbye Columbus and Everyman being the other two), and my least favorite. Don’t get me wrong, it’s quite a read, a sheer avalanche of words, emotions, history, characters, and glove making. There’s a real whiteness-of-the-whale accumulation of details here that s As I neared the end of Philip Roth’s American Pastoral, I couldn’t help but recall Henry James’s tag about Russian novels being “loose and baggy monsters,” and how I might apply that description to Roth’s effort. This is my third Roth (Goodbye Columbus and Everyman being the other two), and my least favorite. Don’t get me wrong, it’s quite a read, a sheer avalanche of words, emotions, history, characters, and glove making. There’s a real whiteness-of-the-whale accumulation of details here that suggests a greater whole. I’m just not sure what that whole is – which may be the point. The book is, at least in part, meant to be about America, with Seymour (“Swede”) Levov, the high school superstar in the role of Captain America – but with a fatal flaw or two, compounded by an uncontrollable history that Roth labels, memorably, “American Berserk.”

“The Swede.” Those are the first two words of the novel (which could have easily been called American Tragedy, but that title is taken), and they are on the lips of Nathan Zuckerman, Roth’s often used protagonist and author. The Swede was Zuckerman’s boyhood hero, a blond bomber who could hit the ball, shoot the ball, and run the ball, like few have ever done. Zuckerman’s meditations on his boyhood idol, and his post-World War Two neighborhood life are wonderful, as are his descriptions of a 45th high school reunion – which open the novel. (What Roth can do with memory and aging and mortality is special and poignant.) While at the reunion Zuckerman runs across the Swede’s brother, Jerry, and finds out that the Swede (who Zuckerman had met for dinner a short time before) had just passed away. What follows, and it’s quite easy to forget this after just a few pages, is Zuckerman’s imagining (the story itself) of the Swede’s life. I don’t know why Roth would choose to add this filter. I need to think about it more. Zuckerman’s got a great, humane voice, an expansive one, one where you hardly detect this transition. But it is there, and I couldn’t help but wonder about it while reading some of the amazingly long winded conversations and meditations from, virtually, every major character.

Simply put, the novel is about seemingly perfect couple, a high school star with golden boy looks, and a former Miss New Jersey (he’s Jewish, she’s Catholic), who give birth to a monster child, Merry, a 1960s style terrorist who hates the Vietnam War, hates her family, hates America, hates. She is Chaos to the Swede’s Order. How did she get this way? Well, it could have started with a mildly (?!!!) incestuous kiss between father and daughter. Roth circles that event as the story progresses. It’s the Great Unsaid, the Edenic bubble pop to the American Dream. The Swede worries about it – on occasion, but Merry never mentions it (though she rages about everything else). However, late in the novel, a former mistress (and Merry’s speech therapist) of the Swede asks him did something bad ever happen at home? Swede doesn’t answer that one. Incest (or a whiff of it – as is the case here) is a powerful fictional tool, but I don’t think it’s the kind of thing that captures a generation’s story. It’s unique, it’s horrible, but it doesn’t explain the 1960s.

And it’s the 1960s, oddly, that don’t seem all that present. Roth lived and wrote through the 1960s, so I was expecting some cool stuff from a writer with his chops. Instead, in AP, published in 1997, those times seem canned, not immediate, unlike Roth’s vital descriptions of the old neighborhood or Zuckerman’s high school reunion. References such as “Deep Throat,” “Vietnam,” “Nixon,” and “Watergate” just struck me as name dropping in order to anchor the story. And no cool music. No Stones. No Beatles. What’s that all about? If you’re throwing bombs, you need a soundtrack. I’ve noticed a number of reviewers (who I really respect) rating this one higher. And a number of them say they look forward to reading AP again. I wasn’t left with that feeling of greatness (which I do feel is the case with Roth's Everyman). I was just glad to be finished. It was a good read, with a number of powerful scenes, but those parts didn’t make for a satisfying – or convincing whole.

...more

22 likes · Like · see review

Feb 24, 2015 Aline Ohanesian rated it it was amazing

Reading this book was like looking into the internal organs of a society. It's messy and ugly and sometimes difficult to look at but you need to look to begin to understand. It wasn't always enjoyable reading and there are parts where the over-analysis got in the way of the storytelling but it's clear to me now why Roth is considered a master. ...more

Like · see review