Constant Reader

[Candy]

Pontalba...uyes it is so fascinating to me as well. I often think the attraction is that through storytelling we live...and we feel...but the learning and ease and enjoyment is because it isn't our actually suffering. Our empathy allows us to feel through charaters and imagination...but they aren't our problems.

I think it is a major survival attribute. (you know...the movie Australia starts with the lines "I learned story"...fascinating!)

I often love the imagination or vision of us around fires for a million years telling stories, over and over...

Andy, yes, the glove factory does make an interesting metaphor for the hard work of making and constructing stories...and tweaking them and re-working them etc

[[deleted user]]

I'll be away from this discussion for a while. I am glad to have been with it this long, but my mind is now unavoidably elsewhere.
Thanks all for your contributions through these weeks. Please keep it going.
Russ

[[deleted user]]

I'll be away from this discussion for a while.

This has been an illuminating and interesting discussion, thanks Russ, and come back as soon as you are able to get us back on track. :)

I often think the attraction is that through storytelling we live...and we feel...but the learning and ease and enjoyment is because it isn't our actually suffering. Our empathy allows us to feel through charaters and imagination...but they aren't our problems.

Yes Candy, exactly! We can close the book and leave it there, no taking the office home in this instance.

In casting about for something to read I found "G" is for Grafton Sue Grafton that is, the author of the 'alphabet detective/mysteries'. Her female detective is Kinsey Millhone, and the stories take place in Santa Teresa, California which just happens to be Grafton's home aka Santa Barbara. :)
I've followed the series and have for the most part enjoyed it, nothing deep, just detecting with a twist. You have to like Kinsey though.

Anyhow, this particular book by Natalie Hevener Kaufman and Carol McGinnis Kay, basically dissects the character and books of Grafton. My round about point is to quote something from said book that pertains to what we were talking about Candy.

Much of the appeal of these novels, then. lies in the dual appeal of escape from our daily lives and of reassurance that we can cope with our daily lives. While most of us don't chase scam artists into Mexico or become the target of a contract killer, we do know the fears of being the next person to be downsized at the office, or being mugged on downtown streets, or finding drug paraphernalia in our child's room. Grafton's novels allow us to confront those fears by fictionalizing and exaggerating the bogeyman into the worst possible situation-murder-and offering Kinsey Millhone as the knight who slays the dragon for us

I suppose that's far enough off track/thread. :)

[Candy]

Pontalba. that is an excellent quote.

I think mystery genre is so satifying...I crave my mysteriy programs on tv too. There is somethign so wonderful about sometimes the bad guys actually get caught. The explanation for part of our attraction to detective stories...the stress of our regular life played out in a mystery story rings true for me. (I am well familiar with Kinsey mysteries...I'm up about "R" or "S'")

[Melissa]

Pontalba at 234 - you mention the passage about always getting people wrong - I summarize it and provide a link at 68 above. That's a perspective that I don't agree with in all respects, but it is surely powerful writing.

Also here: http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/show/...

[[deleted user]]

That's a perspective that I don't agree with in all respects, but it is surely powerful writing.

Philip, I must have missed your first link, thanks for posting it again. :)
I have to say I have mixed feelings about the quote. I think if people are not intentionally deceptive that quote is far less applicable. Trouble is so many people are deceptive in their dealings with others, or are, for whatever reason, afraid to allow their feelings to show it amounts to the same thing.
Swede seems to throw up this 'fair-haired boy' persona in front of his true self, trying to agree with everyone, and in the end losing his daughter. Pre-bombing Merry was unable to allow her true self to come out from behind her bravado front. We don't know exactly why though, at least I don't. We've agreed it was a culmination of many things that caused the stuttering, the rebellion to the point of violence. At least I think we have. :)
I suppose in that respect AP is more like 'real life' than some novels that explain everything. We are not given all the explanations in real life, so that's the way Roth presented his characters.
I think finally I found AP unsatisfying because of that very quality.
Yet I can give it 4 stars with a good conscience because his writing is so powerful.


Candy,
I grew up on Nancy Drew et als, graduating to Holmes as a young teenager and never looked back.
Have you read any of James Lee Burke? His Dave Robicheaux series is dynamite. His prose is gorgeous mixed with compelling characters and all the ambiance of a Louisiana bayou. :)

[Andy]

This is my new favorite sentence from AP:

...the whole thing is really a dazzling illusion...

On another note, there is a way to interpret just about any story as a mystery story. A character doesn't know something about her situation, or she doesn't know something about another character, or she doesn't know something about herself. Or, the author withholds information (either specific facts or aspects of affect)from the audience. It is the unknowns and the misunderstandings and the subterfuges that drive most stories. In mysteries, a lens is held right to the unknown, whereas in "non-mystery" genres, maybe the author tries to trick the audience a little into the mystery from a different angle.

Philip, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on why you don't agree with the getting people wrong bit.

[Melissa]

Andy, actually I do like the getting people wrong passage, it's listed as one of my favorite quotations here. And I even agree with its point of view to a large extent. Surely for all our efforts we do get each other wrong, at least we do most of the time, however "untanklike" we try to be. I also like that "dazzling illusion" bit.

Maybe the hopeful part of me would like to believe that in some circumstances we can get each other right?

[Andy]

Yes, I know what you mean. I consider myself a poor judge of character, but I certainly know people who have great instincts when it comes to relating to people. People who can read body language, people who can strike up conversatios with anyone, people who are understanding and empathetic, are these people more apt to get other people right?

Maybe even if we get somebody right, we're only getting a tiny part of them right. We could never know ALL the details that go into a person, there is just too much. I think that may be part of the reason Roth writes so many details into this book. There are so many details the characters themselves can't even makes sense of their own details. The Swede can only have one thought at a time, after all, and never seems able to put all the details of his life together into a satisfying gestalt for himself. And even if the Swede could understand himself, Zuckerman I suppose couldn't nail it perfectly because he has to process it through all his own details, he would perhaps run into a Heisenberg conundrum, where his position as observer necessarily colors his own perceptions to the point of uncertainty? But now I'm just repeating what Zuckerman says in the first place, what was that quote about how he is creating a story that is not exactly what happened but is just as valid? I'll find it around here.

[Melissa]

Nice points, Andy. For some reason this bit from very early on in this month's CR read, Gilead, strikes me as potentially relevant. (I'm only on p. 6 of the book, so I may change my mind!).

There's a lot under the surface of life, everyone knows that. A lot of malice and dread and guilt, and so much loneliness, where you wouldn't really expect to find it, either.

[Candy]

Philip, that quote from Gilead reminds me of a quote I just read today...

We should be thankful we cannot see the horrors and degredations lying around our childhood, in cupboards and bookshelves, everywhere. Graham Greene The Power and the Glory...which was in the front of a book I just picked up...ready for it Pontalba?...a mystery by Dennis Lehane.

That quote about getting people wrong is quite powerful and challenging.

The thing is...I take it to mean that the one who is wrong is actually wrong about oneself. They are getting themselves wrong with the idea about being somehow "without an overload of bias"...

you know...I wonder if this relates to his nickname. "The Swede".

This novel plays with what we can know about ourselves and especially what can know about someone else...and HOW we can know. (I believe through the empathy of storytelling)

We find that the Swede wants to drive and be ambitious for his dreams for the good life. This is telling because within the first paragraphs of the novel we find this...

Nonetheless, through the Swede, the neighbourhood entered into a fantasy about itself and about the world, the fantasy of sports fans everywhere: almost like Gentiles (as they were imagined Gentiles), our families could forget the way things actually work and make an athletic performance the repository of all their hopes. Primarily, they could forget the war.

I think we might be seeing layer upon layer of how people apply an image over reality.

The idea of being without bias...ties into his nickname...during the war, wasn't Sweden unbiased?

Could this be a metaphor or allegory?

Andy, I think the more one ses and is honest with oneself, the more we can understand others. I think this novel is a little like some of the message in Citizen Kane: "can we know another persons mind? what makes a life?" I think you're right on about creating a story is as valid...and by that I believe it may not be facts...but Roth is exploring "emotional truth"...? I also agree with you that a good exploration of a character is like a detective novel...we want to know who...why...what?

I think part of the issu with the quote Philip has highlighted about "getting people wrong" is that if we don't know ourselves...if we are getting ourselves wrong, then we will get others wrong too.

I think the aspect of how we know we are alive is we get things wrong has a sense of emotioonal truth to it...but I fnd the rest of the paragraph/quote too cynical to be wholy emotionally truth

I'm working through this book again...and I want to see what action is occuring when we come to this quote...

later...

[[deleted user]]

Rereading any book has always provided me with the most amazing insights and even discoveries of passages that I don't remember having read. I recommend it to anyone and I'll be interested in hearing what new discoveries you make, Candy. I discovered the word
"passionate" for the Kiss even after three reads of not seeing it.

[Candy]

Well Russ, I am having quite an interesting time of it already here.

I did read the novel back when it came out and was stunned.

Then I read it just before coming here and reading 200 posts!

It's almost like I lost the novel by the time I read all the posts...now last night, I was noticing so many things differently from reading notes here.

Right away I was struck with how Zuckerman recalls the baseball novels that Swede owned and how he had read them...and this fits so well with the ideas that Andy introduced of postmodernism!

The words used to describe the young kid in school and his popularity are "an arduous inward struggle to keep in check the narscisism that an entire community was ladling" and " but wit and irony is like a hitch in his swing for a kid like Swede, irony6 being a human condition and beside the point if you're getting your way as a god." "his aloofness, his seeming passivity as the desired object of all this asexual lovemaking"

I don't know...these are not the kinds of descriptions for a well adjusted human...they seem rather sociopathic to me...and may be hints into how he moves in the world...

It's very interesting reading this now after reading many of the posts here...

[[deleted user]]

Candy,
Many thanks for your reply. Since you were so kind as to share your thoughts, I'm feeling a little reluctant to prevail on your kindness and seem to differ with you, as if I might have set you up. But perhaps you will permit me one observation. I again have the feeling that you and I are using our similar vocabularies with different meanings. To wit: Violate? Sociopath? I hear those words in different contexts and they have different connotations for me there. And I am willing to consider that it is just me.

[[deleted user]]

The words used to describe the young kid in school and his popularity are "an arduous inward struggle to keep in check the narscisism that an entire community was ladling"

Candy,
I don't see that as an extension of Swede himself, after all he is the one that is trying to fight the attempted imposed narcissism, not be it or cause it, or even endorse it.

...." but wit and irony is like a hitch in his swing for a kid like Swede, irony6 being a human condition and beside the point if you're getting your way as a god." "his aloofness, his seeming passivity as the desired object of all this asexual lovemaking"

I don't know...these are not the kinds of descriptions for a well adjusted human...they seem rather sociopathic to me...and may be hints into how he moves in the world...

Again he is not the instigator, he is the supposed object of said asexual lovemaking.
Nothing sociopathic about that, in fact he stayed pretty level headed throughout all that love making. :)

If he were the instigator, that'd be a whole 'nuther ball game.

The idea of being without bias...ties into his nickname...during the war, wasn't Sweden unbiased?

Could this be a metaphor or allegory?

Yes Sweden was neutral, and as far as I know only played a passive role in WWII.
I see your point, and it could be however at the time I only took it as playing up his Nordic looks thereby dividing him from his Jewish roots/family.
It also could play into his passivity and inability to make any real commitment in life. He seemed to always take the course of least resistance.


To wit: Violate? Sociopath? I hear those words in different contexts and they have different connotations for me there. And I am willing to consider that it is just me.

Russ it isn't just you, I don't see Swede as any sort of sociopath in any way a'tall.
As far as I am concerned he only suffers from what I mentioned above, a reluctance to commit, or take a stand. I mean specifically a stand against his parents [and Dawn's mother as well:] regarding Merry's upbringing.
That turned out to be a serious flaw.

[[deleted user]]

As far as I am concerned he only suffers from what I mentioned above, a reluctance to commit, or take a stand. I mean specifically a stand against his parents [and Dawn's mother as well:] regarding Merry's upbringing.
That turned out to be a serious flaw.


And speaking of flaws, that could well count as the tragic flaw that every classical tragic hero needs one of, in order to cause his eventual downfall. If, that is, one were to regard Swede as the tragic hero of the story.

If one were instead to regard Merry as the tragic hero of the story, then one would be driven to wonder what her tragic flaw was. Always going too far, as she herself suggests early on?

Having said and asked all that, it is more than fascinating that Roth constructs a story in which both tragic flaws are exposed in a single scene, the kissing scene where both flaws are in collision, or perhaps collusion, with each other. That would strike me as a very innovative construction in modern story telling and definitely worth noting to Roth's credit.

Rambling on, I was in Borders the other day and finally had an opportunity to see and browse through 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. Among other synopses, I looked at the one for American Pastoral. According to my recollection (which really puts what I now say in the category of rumor) its author sees AP a metaphor for the turmoil of the late 60's which exposes the key questions such as "What caused these children to reject their parents and advantaged families?" The author goes on to say that the novel further mirrors the reality in providing no answers. One man's rumor, as I say, but hopefully someone with access to the book can check me.

[Candy]

Hey, Russ and Pontalba...I'm not married to the trait sociopath...and it is a bit too sensational a description for the Swede. I was feeling a lack of words for him. Earlier I had said robotic...and that is too sensational as well. I'm aware...it's more like in this discussion...you are putting up with me exploring.

I know it looks messy...but in a lot of ways, I feel that is the nature of this novel. If it's true...as the 1001 Books You Must Read suggests that "the novel further mirrors the reality in providing no answers"...I feel as if, like life, the reader is left with patterns and info to sort out.

I find it fascinating that someone might feel there are no answers in American Pastoral as I see an abundance of "answers"...the challenge is...this novel seems to be toying with the act of storytelling and reading in general.

If Zuckerman's thesis includes the idea that life is the act of being wrong...how do we take the shift from his dinner visit with the Swede, where he was dead bored of this dull man...to the following exploration of his possible life? Or was Zuckerman saying he was wrong then...or just wrong everywhere?

:)

Still working on it...

And although I really am at a loss for what the Swede might be and certainly agre with both Russ and Pontalba that "robotic" or sociopath" are perhaps too sensational for the Swede...I probably will never change my mind about him violating his daughter...with the kiss and his emotional abandonment to follow.

I don't think violation is too extreme a word for the circumstance. Many critics have called the kiss "transgression"...and here is thesaurus...

transgression
noun
1 a punishment for past transgressions offense, crime, sin, wrong, wrongdoing, misdemeanor, impropriety, infraction, misdeed, lawbreaking; error, lapse, peccadillo, fault; archaic trespass.
2 Adam's transgression of God's law infringement, breach, contravention, violation, defiance, disobedience, nonobservance. See note at sin .

(I don't think Merry is a tragic character...I think the Swede is)

[[deleted user]]

Well, I call it something he shouldn't have done.
Sorry, Candy, but that's my homespun vocabulary at work.

[Candy]

Actually, I agree with you. It's something he shouldn't have done.

But also, I don't feel too concerned that lit critics or book review writers have called it a "transgression".

He shouldn't have done it is maybe not a grave enough stance. He walked across a frozen pond with inside shoes, slipped and fell and broke his arm and leg. He shouldn't have walked on the pond with inside dress shoes. (unless he was saving someones life)

But yes, I am fine with it being something he shouldn't have done for life or death reasons though. Not that he shouldn't have done something like turn left at a red light etc.

You know...my first reading of this novel I was impressed by the stry concepts, the play with storytelling, the tragedy and King Lear motif for America...now I am finding I am quite impressed with it's construction and writing!

I am also appreciative of the question you found in that book Russ "What caused these children to reject their parents and advantaged families?

I think just the recognizing that some pattern or mindset...in general...existed for that group of young people in the 60's is a valid thesis!

It gets me revved up...

As someone who wasn't a part of an obviously recognized group of political or cultural subgroup...if you will...it is a fascinating question.

Why did these kids reject their parents and advantaged backgrounds?

If we can't find the answer through Merry's path...can we see a bigger pattern in the novel?

[[deleted user]]

I was talking over this father/daughter kiss with a friend tonight and she brought out that of course Merry wouldn't have understood the sexual connotations of her request and by the same token, Swede could and did. Hence his immediate rejection of the request. It was her obvious hurt that caused him to even consider it when the momentary lapse of moral judgement took over. Although I think placating her was more on his mind than any question of right or wrong.
Perhaps also, Merry had tapped into the excellent sexual relationship between Swede and Dawn and not understanding the nature of the relationship, only wanted not the sex, but the loving feeling she sensed between her parents.

[[deleted user]]

Almost needless to say, I also have been giving considerable thought to the scene and how to characterize it, and I think finally the root of my reaction is "I just don't believe it." This could turn into a long essay critiquing the scene line-by-line, because I have indeed looked at it that way, but I'll try to summarize many thoughts briefly.

First of all, I think the scene has the weakest, least convincing writing, of any scene in the book. All the others I find easily believable and entirely plausible; this one I do not. I'm sounding a little like Lou Levov there. Sorry. :) It does not ring true to me, and I cannot suspend disbelief for it. Which means the kiss does not engage my thoughts or emotions in any significant way. Or to put it another way, I am not invested in it.

Or let me put it yet another way. When one goes to a movie, one passes cardboard display ads in the lobby with scenes from other movies, or even from the movie one is going to see. Those are just scenes to look at; the real movie is inside. To me the kiss is just one of those flat scenes to look at; the real movie is inside.

I think it is as transparent as air that Zuckerman was concocting a scene for the sole structural and literary purpose of creating an episode for Swede to feel endlessly guilty about, and torment himself with, for the rest of his days. Which he does. In my imagination, Zuckerman, right then, was indeed thinking "Let's see. How do I start this story? I need something to give Swede 'the guilts'."

Having served that purpose the scene is forgotten and its detailed significance rapidly fades away, again in my opinion. The actual content of a scene to accomplish Zuckerman's purpose seems almost entirely irrelevant to the plot and to me; any intensely embarrassing event might have served as well, in my opinion. Let's say, father and daughter accidentally encountering each other totally naked for the first time, there at the beach house for some reason while changing bathing suits. An introspective brooding father, such as Swede is portrayed to be, might always wonder what effect that might have had on his daughter. Or any other scene of sudden embarrassment. Make up your own. Obviously it will depend on one's own background and acculturation.

Put yet a fourth way, when one reads the individual sentences leading up to it, that scene seems as artificial and posed as a movie kiss. My reaction is that Zuckerman is stage-managing every move and action (and over-explaining every inch of the way) and that Swede has no alternative finally but to do exactly what Zuckerman the director wants him to do. Zuckerman has his actor firmly by the neck and, when all camera angles are ready, says "OK, roll 'em! Now kiss!" For that reason it strikes me as a peculiarly passionless scene. And I also sense a certain leering quality in the director's unconvincing lead up, which also repels me.

Having now said all of that, let me say that there is one part of the scene that cuts me to the emotional core, outrages me, and brings me to the verge of tears with immensely powerful writing. And that is when Merry apologizes to her father, saying she always goes too far. No child, and I repeat no child, should ever feel they have to apologize to their parent -- least of all in such a self-abasing and self-abnegating manner -- for an action of the parent's. Those few words outrage me completely and indeed suggest to me that psychological harm has been done to Merry somewhere along the line, even if not in this scene, but possibly also compounded by it.

Just sayin. Nobody asked, so I thought I would.
Cheers!

[[deleted user]]

I think it is as transparent as air that Zuckerman was concocting a scene for the sole structural and literary purpose of creating an episode for Swede to feel endlessly guilty about, and torment himself with, for the rest of his days. Which he does. In my imagination, Zuckerman, right then, was indeed thinking "Let's see. How do I start this story? I need something to give Swede 'the guilts'."

Wowee. I was so busy trying to understand the feelings and wondering why I couldn't get too upset about it and you've hit the nail on the head.
It makes perfect sense to me.
It was the up-front scene that was rammed down the readers throat right off the bat in his imagined chronicle.

What better than forbidden sexual content to give Swede a case of 'the guilts'. Especially a scene that is presented in such diametrically opposed views.

[[deleted user]]

It was the up-front scene that was rammed down the readers throat right off the bat in his imagined chronicle.

Well, Pontalba, yes it was the very first scene, and I have wondered why Zuckerman chose to start off that way. After all, he had just seen a happy Swede over dinner not so long before. And then at the reunion had heard of Merry the Bomber. So I suppose he felt he needed somehow to make Swede less than perfect and knock him off his pedestal. Moreover, he tells his story in a way to end up with Swede's life falling in ruins around him at the end of the book, despite knowing that Swede was happy when he saw him over dinner, twenty some years after all the events in the realistic chronicle were over. So he was setting Swede up for failure from the git-go. That disconnect on both ends of the realistic chronicle puzzles me still.

[Wilhelmina]

OK, now I'm begging. PLEASE run directly to your Netflix accounts and order Eve's Bayou. It is a superb movie, and it deals with a similar, and highly destructive, father-daughter kiss. I am pretty sure that Roger Ebert picked this as his top movie of the year about ten years ago.

[[deleted user]]

The floor is definitely open for discussion of destructive father-daughter kisses. I'm certainly not going to contest anything anyone wants to say, even without having seen Eve's Bayou and I'll hold my skepticism and calmness re AP while the subject is ventilated. I've said before I know nothing about the topic so, those that do, please carry on.
By the way Wilhelmina, glad to see that you were still listening. :)

[[deleted user]]

So, anyone?

[Sherry]

Mina, I did see Eve's Bayou, but it was so long ago, I don't remember a thing about it. Maybe it's time for a re-showing.

[[deleted user]]

Or perhaps, possibly, some slightly more specific tie-in(s) with American Pastoral, with spoilers marked if need be. I am continually eager to hear of how people see connections between The Kiss and anything else that happens in American Pastoral, which is after all the book we are discussing. For example, did the kiss make Merry a terrorist bomber? Did it make her an unruly revolutionary adolescent? Did it turn her against Dawn and her cattle raising? Does Zuckerman think, or intend, that it did any of those things? Did it make her a Jain? (Please excuse my simple mind, any who continue to find me uncomprehending). I fail to find such connections, but I again promise I will listen to all thoughts offered and not challenge them.

[Wilhelmina]

I agree with you, Russ. I don't see the kiss as being even remotely that powerful a force. But the kiss led to emotional distance, something that often happens with fathers and daughters when girls reach adolescence. I think that Roth/Zuckerman used the kiss as the event that precipitates the separation between Swede and Merry. Zuckerman, musing on what could have caused such a rift in the life of the "golden boy", imagines this Electra moment. It doesn't seem quite real, but I think that what we're supposed to take from it is Merry's sense of abandonment and Swede's guilt,.

Sure, Russ, I've been here all along!

[[deleted user]]

Thanks Wilhelmina.
Pondering your reply. Lips zipped. :)
Russ

[Ruth]

Wilhelmina wrote: "I agree with you, Russ. I don't see the kiss as being even remotely that powerful a force. But the kiss led to emotional distance, something that often happens with fathers and daughters when girls..."

I agree, Mina. But given the taboos that smoke in all our closets, Roth should have known that people would latch onto that incident and expand it beyond its limits.

[Gail]

Mmm...yes, Ruth, I agree that Roth should have known how people would take the incident and almost enlarge it to consume most of the rest of the novel. Perhaps, being Roth, he realized this and just didn't care.

I also agree with Mina and with Ross about the unreality of the scene/event. Thanks, Ross; I couldn't put it into words myself, that seeking for something that Swede could agonize over forever, trying to find where his fault or responsibility lies for Merry's behaviors.

It's not uncommon for emotional distancing to occur between fathers and daughters as the daughters grow up, as Mina has pointed out; maybe the dads are trying to make sure nothing like this could ever happen; I don't know.

What I found most interesting is the line (I approximate) "I don't want to talk about my mother." Well. Obviously there is an entire volcano under that statement that Roth totally ignores. We never get to see real interaction between Dawn and Merry; all our scenes are filtered through Swede's (or Zuckerman's or Roth's; take your pick) eyes. I found Dawn's character to be repellent. However, I blame this, maybe unfairly, on Roth. So easy to blame the mom.

Ross, I don't think we can pinpoint any of Merry's motivations very well. People/characters are too complex to be easily analyzed, I think. In this way Merry seemed more real to me than she would have if she had been more, uh, clearly motivated.

I liked the book on first reading, and admire Roth's dexterity, but the more I reflect on it, the less I like it.

[[deleted user]]

. . .but the more I reflect on it, the less I like it.

Gail! Mercy, please! I hope you are not going to leave us hanging there!

[Barbara]

I finally finished American Pastoral over Thanksgiving Break while traveling and have spent the next week trying to read through the discussion here, lots of interesting stuff. However, I had an impression at the end that I didn't see covered here (correct me if I'm wrong, I might have missed it). I didn't get the sense that Merry actually did come home, at least in Zuckerman's metafiction. Swede hears the uproar in the kitchen and imagines all of the detail of Merry walking home as he is running to the noise. When he arrives, there is no Merry, only Lou stabbed with a fork. And, there is nothing said about her after that.

Also, I kept wondering if part of Merry's problem was that she was a transplanted half-Jew, half-Catholic in a WASP world. It seemed to me that she kept grabbing onto these absolutes in an effort to define herself when she had no other group reference.

And, just as an aside, as a former speech therapist, I wanted to throttle that psychiatrist who implied that she was stuttering voluntarily in order to control her environment. If you have ever been around a severe stutterer, you would know how desperately each one would choose not to do so. However, they often don't stutter when they are saying a memorized piece or singing. When she was reciting the theory of the Jains, she wasn't formulating the thoughts herself. Therefore, she was stuttering free.

[[deleted user]]

Also, I kept wondering if part of Merry's problem was that she was a transplanted half-Jew, half-Catholic in a WASP world. It seemed to me that she kept grabbing onto these absolutes in an effort to define herself when she had no other group reference.

Barbara, that's partially what I was trying to bring out when I mentioned the grandmothers each dragging at her, plus all of Lou's ranting certainly set a strong example that should have been counteracted by either Swede or Dawn.

As an only child and only grandchild, I certainly can attest to strong willed grandparents, but my parents brooked no interference with my raising, so I've seen the other end of the spectrum of that business.

That Swede did not put his foot down with his parents is the real crux of the matter, perhaps his fatal flaw in fact.

[Robert]

Barb,

I also experienced that the screaming at the end of Swede’s hellish dinner party did not turn out to be about the arrival of the starving, filthy Merry (the irony of her name dripping all over the Persian rug) but rather were screams about what it took to get Lou to shut up. So that Merry never had her walk amidst all those late summer flowers from the village of Old Rimrock to her home. It wasn’t apparent to me that Merry wasn’t actually walking home until the fork-you conclusion.

Robt

[Robert]

Here’s a quote about the melodramatic climax of Zuckerman’s fantasy about Merry’s return home (p 421, Vintage) which strikes me as simultaneously sincere and satiric:

“Four people, Grandpa,” [Merry had:] told him, and his heart could not bear it. Divorce was bad enough in a family, but murder, and the murder not merely of one but of one plus three? The murder of four?

“No!” exclaimed Grandpa to this veiled intruder reeking of feces who claimed to be their beloved Merry, “No!” and his heart gave up, gave out, and he died.

Robt

[Gail]

First, Russ2, thank you for not pointing out my utter lameness in mispelling your name. So sorry...

I also didn't think that Merry (yes indeed, what an obvious bit of manipulation that name is) came home. I thought it all ended with the forking incident. The citation by Robert struck me a bit differently from the way it struck him: I thought it shamelessly goofy.

I would have to disagree with Pontalba and Sherry regarding the displacement theory (for lack of a better term). That is, her sense of not belonging may have been an adequate motive in Merry's seeking for absolutes, but it doesn't seem to me to be enough to cover the murder(s). It certainly would explain her abundant, continuously evolving enthusiasms. On the other hand, lots of kids have these periods of intense involvement with one thing and then another, but don't go as far as Merry in their searching. I don't blame the grandparents, really, at all; who doesn't have slightly weird grandparents? To me that would be a normal part of growing up: learning to understand and accept or reject these sometimes absurdly excited conversations and opinions of the older adults. I do see that Mum and Dad should have talked with her about these issues, however. I think we should remember, though, that this story takes place in the fifties/sixties, when ideas of child rearing were a bit different than they are now.

Oh, and the stuttering? I could have choked that therapist quite cheerfully. I think her analysis of the stuttering was horrendous and very, very harmful to Merry and to both Dawn and Swede.

Russ, I still admire Roth's writing abilities. For example, I found the reuniuon scene, which some others thought ran on far, far too long, to be pretty realistic. I attended one of these not long ago (my spouse's, thank God, not my own), and it was a lot like that. And if I hadn't been looking for it, I probably would have missed the transition to Zuckerman's imagining of Swede's story, as Roth made it so smoothly seamless. Lou Levov seemed to be a real person whom I'd probably met more than once. Also, Swede's actions and thoughts seemed to me to be quite reasonably realistic. He didn't see himself as perfect, certainly; it's not his fault that Zuckerman idolized him into some sort of demi-god.

All that said, I didn't like the lack of motivation for Merry's extremism; I thought Dawn's character both underdeveloped and meanly portrayed; the plot resolution was, at best, weak; and, this may be comlete gender bias on my part, but it seems to me that Roth's portrayal of women in this book is rather biased...as in, he hates them. Well, perhaps that's a bit strong, but all the female characters are either hateful or apparently loony. Surely this is one-sided.

But that's often the way with books: that first read is so exciting, as you are drawn into the plot and can't wait to find out what happens...and then after reflection, you ask, "Wait...what just happened here?"

[[deleted user]]

Gail,
Thank you so much for coming back and offering that insightful post! I can't resist a quick reaction -- it is so on target -- even though I'll be spending more time thinking about exactly the question you close with.
First, in praise of women, I'd at least offer Sylvia Levov as the wonderful patient woman Lou was fortunate enough to marry, even if you do cause me to see all the others in a different way. I'll have to think more about Dawn.
But, as for men, I have to echo your comment about women. I didn't see any to thrill me. Swede maybe, but he spent most of his time walking around in semi-god-like status, so I just saw him mainly as fictional protagonist to move the story along. The Reunion? Yes, they are like that aren't they? Slobs and all. One was enough for me.
Please do hang around. I'm hoping that maybe this discussion is finding its second wind.
For a provocative question of my own, I'll wonder out loud just how many extremist youth of the late 60's had any more grounded motivation than Merry?
Sincerely
The real Russ :)

[Robert]

1968 is in the news again. Recently released audiotapes of President Lyndon Johnson reveal Johnson accusing Nixon of treason for sabotaging peace talks to end the Vietnam War. Evidently Nixon did this as a political strategy to get himself elected President in 1968.

Robt

[Wilhelmina]

it seems to me that Roth's portrayal of women in this book is rather biased...as in, he hates them.

I agree, Gail. This is not a man who likes or understands women very much.

I also agree about the grandparents. Perhaps this is my view because I am a grandparent, but I don't see their influence as toxic. Children are usually able to pick and choose among their grandparents' viewpoints, slightly nutty or not. Trying to get all of the grandparents in line with the parents' world view is a fool's errand at best. I think that we're just trying to fund someone to blame for Merry's outcome and there really is no one to blame.

[Candy]

Fantastic to read all these wonderful posts! Really good stuff here!

I've really been playing this book out over and over and it's really got me. I have a strange feeling like Gails, that the more I am looking into it's structure and various tones...I am at a place where I am kind of offput. I do beliee that this is an incredible novel, I really do feel it's a masterpiece. But it is also incredibly annoying on some level, heh heh!

I think the female characters are out there...and the way I take it is related to Russ feeling that the sudden intro of the kiss was so manipulative or maybe an easy trick.

I've got a few feelings about this...and the first is, it's almost like this is the version of a man who isn't with women and doesn't communicate well with them and didn't have kids. It's his idea of how a father could screw up. I think there is some emotional truth to the idea but it is told from someone who doesn't realally know.

I am playing over the part at the beginning after dinner where Zuckerman gives his rant on "getting it wrong" ...

The way this progresses is we meet the Swede and Zuckerman is so bored, the guy is a pill and Zuckerman then says he was wrong.

Wrong about what?

Wrong about the depth of the Swede? About his involvement in life? His sufferering? About whether he is an interesting person or not?

I find the Swede quite repulsive from the get go. The only part where he is "real" is that first dinner with Zuckerman, right?

For me, the Swede was never redeemed for me during the rest of the novel. I feel like Zuckerman DID get him right. He says he didn't so I assumed the rest of the novel was about showing a good side to this man...

But I found the Swede a complete...jerk. Safest word I could muster. In the evening where they have dinner at Vincents we find out that the Swede doesn't seem to see why his old neightbourhood is the worst place in the world. (pages 23-24)

The Swede tells Zuckeman how virtually the whole industry had moved offshore: the unions had made it more and more difficult for a manufacturer to make any money, you could hardly find people to do that kind of piecework anymore, or to do it the way you wanted it done, and elsewhere there was an availability of workers who could be trained nearly to the standards that had obtained in the glove industry forty and fifty years ago. His family had kept their operation going in Newark for quite a long time...(tried to save jobs, many black workers)

It's the worst city in the world Skip, the Swede was telling me. "Used to be the city where they manufactured everything. Now it's the car-theft capital of the world. Did you know that? Not the most gruesome of the gruesone developments but its awful enough. The theives live mostly in our neighbourhood. Black kids. forty cars stolen in Newark every twenty-four hours. Thats the statistic."

If this weren't so sad I might have laughed. The Swede goes on and on about how horrible his old Newark is and the business...but if a manufacturer makes profit the prioroty, and doesn't want to pay union...moves work outside the U.S. then what the heck does he think is going to happen? No work, no decent wages=crime rises. It's not like union pay is that much money...a family can barely live on one union wage anymore. They used to be able to get by. I mean 18-28 dollars an hour isn't asking that much for a pay wage? Yet...these kinds of attitudes about undrmining the unions protection...moving work out of the U.S. to make profits...

What did people think it might look like? Stolen cars, angry kids, broken communities....thats what it looks like.

For me, in many ways this idea of a family who puts profit ahead of community is bound for a backlash. And this is the root of the novel in many ways for me. It's the side of following dreams or working hard...to get oneself comfortable...that has the potential of selfish ethics...inside this "american dream"...is a selfish attitude potentially. On one hand...good to follow your dreams. On the other...a dark side of selfishness might be encouraged.

I think the rest of the novel is Zuckerman exploring what the dark side of the selfish urge inside the Levov family might be...the Swede might be the kind of father who gives his daughter confusing messages about love and intimacy, that might have a daughter who didn't get the help she needed with speaking, who grew up questioning the ethics and morals of a family who had profit as a priority?

I also...found the Jerry character to be a highly suspicious narrator. I suspect we saw a lot of jealousy acted out once he became a successful surgeon, this whole family was creepy to me.

Is there anything "nice" aor ethically admirable in the rest of the book about the Swede? Was Zuckerman really wrong as he says in the first 30 pages?

[[deleted user]]

I don't blame the grandparents, really, at all; who doesn't have slightly weird grandparents?

Gail, In probably 85% of cases, I'd agree with you, but I happen to have had one of the most "toxic" grandmothers around and so have seen up close how it can happen if the parent allows it. I was fortunate in my parents, they stood up to her.
I guess that part hits close to home for me and why I blame Swede and Dawn for allowing it.

I wished for Dawn's character to be more defined, it left the reader at loose ends trying to figure her out. What was there I didn't think much of and have to agree with you that Roth doesn't care for or understand women a bit.

For some unexplained reason Swede simply didn't have any real...courage...no that's not exactly right, he must not have had any real sense of his own identity, that's the closest I can come to understanding why he didn't stand up to.......anyone, not even Merry who in my opinion should have been dragged out by her hair when he found her in that awful place. I've vacillated in by feelings about that scene, but in the end I feel it was his final chance to redeem himself. He failed. He knew it and that I think is why in the end he was a shell of a man. Yes. He walked and talked and procreated, but he'd failed in his responsibility. To Merry, to Dawn, and worst of all maybe...to himself.

[[deleted user]]

I love it! As the discussion goes on, I am having more and more of these WDIK moments. Great! :)

[[deleted user]]

What Do I Know, before anyone asks. :)

[Gail]

Yes, thank you *so* much, Pontalba...as a parent I can't imagine not physically picking up the young person and hauling her off to at least some chance of functioning in the world. I mean, you know, therapy or whatever help one could find just to get her (sorry for the repetition, my brain must be on ice) functional again. In fact, I was mentally begging Swede to get her out of there and get her some help. Also I don't understand why he didn't sit down with her much earlier and work on broadening her understanding of what was happening in the world, or perhaps guide her to more productive ways of protest/activism. To just abdicate his parental role as guide/teacher/helper and let Merry ramble on in her diatribes, becoming more and more hung up in her endless loop, certainly didn't help the situation at all. Not that I think the parents are to blame here, exactly.

Again, I think Merry's motivations are unexplained. I believe Roth used precisely that fact to demonstrate how the "typical" upwardly moving American lifestyle dream could be (pardon me) exploded without any apparent rational motives. Unfortunately, for me that makes the book weaker than I would have liked to have seen it.

Yes, absolutely, Russ, Sylvia was a good woman. But she's really just a background character, sort of a foil for old Lou. Merry, Dawn, the therapist, that wicked mess of a temptress...all horrid. In fact, almost unbelievably so. I find this disconcerting at best. Oddly, I noticed when this discussion started that a lot more men were participating than usual...at least it seemed so to me. So would that perhaps indicate that Roth is more easily appreciated by men? I dunno.

Barbara, I apologize for earlier crediting Sherry with your sentiments (re: displacement). Sorry.

I don't think American Pastoral is a masterpiece.

Candy, it is so interesting to me that we could read the same passage and come to almost opposite conclusions. This isn't the place to debate the profit motive, though. I do agree about Jerry; who could trust his interpretation? But it does serve a purpose in enlarging our view of Swede. Also interesting that you find Swede "repulsive." How so? I didn't see him that way at all. He seemed to me to be a well-meaning but ulitmately weak character done in by that weakness and, as Pontalba points out, his lack of self-awareness. I don't like him, but I didn't feel that strongly about it. It's telling, I think, that he created a whole new life for himself with the new wife and the boys, and put away all the horrible stuff. Was it too painful? Or is he just an unfeeling dolt? Again, I dunno.

Russ, I remember those days of protest well, although I was quite sheltered from it all as I had a brand-new baby to tend to. I still recall with dismay my dad's reaction to the events at Kent State: he was of the opinion that the kids wouldn't have been killed if they hadn't been in the wrong, protesting and all. That was a moment of complete disconnect between us, and it was painful in the extreme. Probably painful to him, too, as I stared at him in disbelief. Anyway, I'm not sure that the motives of the extemists then were any more clear than Merry's. I don't pretend to understand extemists of any sort, so maybe I'm not the best one to address this. I'd be happy to see some other ideas on this.

Congratulations to all for a marvelously meaty and thought-provoking discussion.

[Robert]

Steve, Regarding Merry’s return home, you wrote: “It’s Zuckerman’s fantasy of Swede’s imaginings.” That’s it! Thanks for putting your finger on it.

Robt

[Barbara]

My sense is that Roth is painting with a broad brush here. These characters are more like symbols to me and I'm not sure that we're going down productive paths when we critique their authenticity. Roth always seems to be dealing with his ambivalence about being part of a Jewish community. But, he's not optimistic about leaving it either. Zuckerman's (and Roth's) fantasy of Swede and Merry feels like a cautionary tale. What happens to a Jew who is celebrated for not looking like one? Even his Jewish community looks up to him because he can assimilate. So, what happens when he takes that assimilation to its logical conclusion? Total destruction for his offspring and a life of regret for him. Pretty scary stuff, I think.

[Gail]

Here's what comes of thinking too much about books:

Lying in bed last night, I started to wonder if A.P. is in fact Roth's somewhat unwieldy metaphor for 9/11, with Swede reperesenting the U.S. population in its unthinking ways (with some undertones of the gov'.t in his family business history) and Merry representing those folks who believe that the U.S. is a an evil behemoth running amok which must be stopped at all costs. Probably this fantasm is entirely the result of reading my favorite iconoclast, Gore Vidal, directly before turning out the light. Certainly Barbara's theory makes more sense, given Roth's previous work.

[Sara]

As Candy said some posts back, she persuaded me to read this--although, contrary to what she posted, I've never tried it before. I just find Roth unappealing in general. I read Portnoy when I was way too young, certainly, and then 15 years or so ago in a critical reading class for writers when the subject came up, remarked that I didn't think much of it. The (male) teacher said, "Well, that's because you didn't grow up with a penis." I got up and walked out of the class.

So, some history with PR.

I will just comment, Gail, that given that the book was published several years before the attacks occurred, it does seem unlikely.

Anyway, I finished a rather grim book last night, so am reading something a little lighter. I expect to be through a big chunk of American Pastoral by early next week.

Sara