Reading Philip Roth. Edited by ASHER Z. MILBAUER. Associate Professor of English Florida International University. and

Transcription

1 READING PHILIP ROTH

2 Reading Philip Roth Edited by ASHER Z. MILBAUER Associate Professor of English Florida International University and DONALD G. WATSON Associate Professor of English Florida International University M MACMILLAN PRESS

3 Asher Z. Milbauer and Donald G. Watson 1988 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1 st edition All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1956 (as amended). Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. First published 1988 Published by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LID Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world Typeset by Wessex Typesetters (Division of The Eastem Press Ltd) Frome, Somerset British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Reading Philip Roth 1. Roth, Philip--Criticism and interpretation I. Milbauer, Asher Z. 11. Watson, Donald G. 813'.54 PS Z1 ISBN ISBN (ebook) DOI /

4 For our wives and parents Luba, Tzviya and Yishayahu Nancy, Louise and Garner

5 Contents Preface Acknowledgements Notes on the Contributors ix xi xiii 1 An Interview with Philip Roth 1 Asher Z. Milbauer and Donald G. Watson 2 The Artist as a Jewish Writer 13 Aharon Appelfeld 3 From Newark to Prague: Roth's Place in the American-Jewish Literary Tradition 17 Hana Wirth-Nesher 4 The Shape of Exile in Philip Roth, or the Part is Always Apart 33 Martin Tucker 5 Strangers in a Strange Land: The Homelessness of Roth's Protagonists 50 Estelle Gershgoren Novak 6 Half a Lemon, Half an Egg 73 Martin Green 7 Fictions of Metamorphosis: From Goodbye, Columbus to Portnoy's Complaint 82 Donald Kartiganer 8 Fiction, Show Business, and the Land of Opportunity: Roth in the Early Seventies 105 Donald G. Watson 9 Portnoy's Prayer: Philip Roth and the American Unconscious 126 Sam B. Girgus vii

6 viii Contents 10 'None Other': The Subject of Roth's My Life as a Man Patrick O'Donnell 11 Some Notes on Roth's My Life as a Man and The Professor of Desire Milan Kundera 12 The Son is Father to the Man Clive Sinclair 13 The Unspeakable Self: Philip Roth and the Imagination Jonathan Brent Index

7 Preface By presenting our readers with the thirteen essays especially written for this anthology, * we hope to extend the critical understanding of Philip Roth's fiction and to clarify some fundamental misunderstandings of his intentions and meanings. After having reviewed both the academic and journalistic critical responses to Roth's canon, we realise that while some of them are solid and helpful, many are permeated by a constant confusion of tale and teller, a confusion that defeats the very essence of literary criticism - to lead the reader to the text rather than away from it. In fact, this is exactly what Nathan Zuckerman, Roth's protagonistauthor and frequently his mouthpiece as well, requires of the critic of his own fiction: 'It's one thing to think you're pretending to your students when you tell them there's a difference between the characters and the author, if that's the way you see it these daysbut to strip the book of its tone, the plot of its circumstances, the action of its momentum, to disregard totally the context that gives to a theme its spirit, its flavor, its life -.' Although out of breath and too exasperated to complete his sentence, Zuckerman manages to convey a clear message to his critics: to perceive the book's tone, to follow its plot, to discern the spirit of its theme the text must be read. Indeed, this obsessive urge to read attentively and to respond reflexively emerges not only as a recurrent motif in Philip Roth's fiction but also as a key to understanding it. One cannot help but notice that all of Roth's main fictional characters are constantly reading and responding to their readings. Whether they read, interpret (or misinterpret) Shakespeare or Chekhov, Flaubert or Mann, James or Babel, Kafka or Tolstoy, or themselves, as Zuckerman's own case testifies, they remind Roth's own readers of the notion that literature matters, that it may be a means to know the world and bring meaning to an 'unhallowed existence'. All this, however, can be achieved only if the writer's work is read. And there is hardly anything wrong, maintains Roth in his interview with us, if it is then misread, provided 'what's meant [by Milan Kundera's essay is based upon two pieces published in French but rewritten for this volume. The editors are responsible for the translations. ix

8 x Preface rnisreadings] isn't [a] reading that's shallow and stupid, but that's fixed in its course by the reader's background, ideology, sensibility, etc.'. In editing this collection of essays we never asked of our contributors anything more than to reread Roth's books and to suggest fresh ways of looking at his corpus of fiction. This they have done with much discretion, skill, and talent. We are grateful to them. A.Z.M. D.G.W.

9 Acknowledgements While editing this anthology we accumulated a number of debts. We want to thank David Reif for his assistance in translating from French and Richard Schwartz for his helpful comments on several of the essays. Our special thanks go to Elaine Dillashaw and Vilma Valdes for preparing the manuscript for publication and patiently responding to our many demands. Finally, we should like to thank Philip Roth for being accommodating and generous with his time. Permission to quote from Zuckerman Bound published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux is gratefully acknowledged. xi

10 Notes on the Contributors Aharon Appelfeld is Professor of Literature at Beersheva University and a leading Israeli novelist. His books include such celebrated novels as Badenheim 1939, Tzili, The Age of Wonders and To the Land of the Cattails. Jonathan Brent, Professor of English at Northwestern University, is the editor of Best of TriQuarterly and A John Cage Reader. He is the Director and editor-in-chief of Northwestern University Press and editor of Formations magazine. Estelle Gershgoren Novak, poet and essayist, teaches at the University of California, Los Angeles; for the last twenty years she has published widely in a variety of journals and anthologies. Sam B. Girgus, Director of American Studies at the University of Oregon is the author of The Law of the Heart: Individualism and the Modern Self in American Literature, The New Covenant: Jewish Writers and the American Idea, and editor of The American Self: Myth, Ideology and Popular Culture. Martin Green, Professor of English at Tufts University, is the author of Children of the Sun, Cities of Light and Sons of the Morning, and Dreams of Adventure, Deeds of Empire. He is the editor of A Philip Roth Reader. Donald Kartiganer is Professor of English at the University of Washington. He is the author of The Fragile Thread: The Meaning of Form in Faulkner'S Novels and editor of Theories of American Literature. Milan Kundera is a Czech novelist currently residing in Paris; formerly a professor at the Prague Institute for Advanced Cinematographic Studies, he is now a faculty member at the Practical School of Advanced Studies in Paris. Among his publications are such widely acclaimed books as The Joke, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, Life is Elsewhere. His most recent novel is The Unbearable Lightness of Being. xiii

11 xiv Notes on the Contributors Asher Z. Milbauer, Professor of English at Florida International University, is the author of Transcending Exile: Conrad, Nabokov, I. B. Singer. He has recently completed a soon-to-be-published study on 'The Image of Eastern Europe in American-Jewish Literature'. Patrick O'Donnell, Professor of English and Director of Undergraduate Studies at the University of Arizona, is the author of John Hawks and Passionate Doubts: Designs of Interpretation in Contemporary Fiction. Clive Sinclair is a British novelist, short-story writer and essayist. His most recently published book is Blood Libels. He is the book editor of The Jewish Chronicle. Martin Tucker, Professor of English at Long Island University, is the author of Africa in Modern Literature and Joseph Conrad and editor of more than fifteen volumes of literary encyclopedias. He is the editor of Confrontation magazine, as well as a widely published poet. Donald G. Watson is Professor of English at Florida International University. He has published essays on the writings of Shakespeare, Boccaccio, Erasmus and is the author of a book about Shakespeare's early history plays. Hana Wirth-Nesher, Professor of English and Chair of the English Department at Tel Aviv University, is the author of numerous essays and studies on American, British and Jewish fictions. She is the author of a book on urban fiction entitled Legible Cities.