American Pastoral
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65 of 74 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Philip Roth won the Pulitzer Prize for this riveting, quietly horrifying novel that shatters the idyllic illusion of an America that once might have been, but will be no more. American Pastoral is a brilliant commentary on our inability to effectively see beneath the surface of apparent well-being and contentment in others. The first of the "Zuckerman trilogy," (which ends with The Human Stain), American Pastoral recalls and builds on Roth's most accomplished and self-referential fiction of the past.
As the novel opens, Skip Zuckerman, the childless, unattached, first-person narrator of the trilogy has a chance meeting with a boyhood hero at a baseball game. This hero is Swede Levov, an older man who is still, impossibly blonde, blue-eyed and youthful; a legend within his predominantly Jewish neighborhood. Swede is the very embodiment of "America" and all that "being American" stands for. He is, Skip is sure, incapable of living anything but the perfect, and perfectly rewarding, life.
Swede's brother, Jerry, was Skip's best friend, so when Swede asks for a meeting with Skip, Skip is a little puzzled but not all that surprised. Swede, however, doesn't ask anything specific of Skip, but talks of his sons and his memories of Newark before and during World War II. This meeting, though, is pivotal to the novel's central question and its meaning soon becomes crystal clear.
As the novel progresses, Skip attends his high school reunion and, while making note of the various deficiencies shared by the sixtyish men and women in attendance, becomes convinced that no human being ever really knows or understands another. He is depressed by all the conversation about cancer, divorce and the various problems associated with growing older. It is Jerry, though, Swede's brother, who tells Skip the one thing that will disillusion more than any other.
Roth's brilliance as well as his masterful and well-crafted prose draw us into American Pastoral and allow us to participate in the mundane life experiences of its characters as if those experiences were our very own. We live through school reunions, failed marriages, duplicity and waste as Skip proceeds to a more detailed examination of the life of Swede Levov.
Swede's life, Skip finds out, was nothing like he had imagined it would be. Obsessed, Skip begins a novel that focuses on the life of Swede Levov. Although Skip is making up a lot of his book as he goes along, the story is nonetheless true and it is a story that will resonate painfully with anyone who has ever felt alone, in control, out of control, or who has thought that he or she knew all about someone they have cared about deeply. As the facts about Swede Levov's life slowly unfold, as his secrets are unearthed, the glossy veneer of satisfaction, contentment and perfection begins to slip away from his life. As the man behind the persona is fully revealed, we come to realize, with Skip Zuckerman, that in anyone's life, one torment can, and often does, lead to more and more agony until its inevitability is appalling.
American Pastoral is more of an impassioned dialogue with its readers than a convincing and linear story. This is not a warm and comforting book that will leave a glow in your heart after the last page. In fact, its most convincing and most powerfully-written passages are those in which Swede and Skip discuss and reflect upon human nature's congenital loneliness.
American Pastoral is a painful book; it is a book that explores a dark and lonely side of human nature. But it is masterfully written, in prose that is spare and elegant and, above all, authentic. At its heart, American Pastoral is a gorgeous elegy for the American Dream; a funeral ode to an innocence that has long since passed away.
14 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
American Pastoral is the first of a trilogy so loosely connected that even the publisher draws no attention to it. It wasn't until I had read the third volume - The Human Stain - that I realised I had come in at the end, and went back to the beginning with this book (the second volume is I Married A communist).
But reading The Human Stain first does throw American Pastoral into relief. The writing in American Pastoral is as magnificent, but the combination of plot and polemic far less satisfying. Whereas The Human Stain races along in a taut tension between the uncovering of secrets and the unmasking of humanity, American Pastoral is an obsessional, almost pathologically forensic, dissection of the American Way, with the plot acting only as a frustratingly episodic driver.
On the face of it this is a tale of how a man who is the perfect embodiment of the American Dream is blighted by the sheer simplicity of his perfection. He is undone by deviancy right on his doorstep. It's a deviancy he is powerless to prevent because it comes from the person to whom he is most devoted: his daughter.
It's a brilliant premise - so brilliant you long for more of the book to focus directly on it. Yet much of what you get instead is gloves. Yes, gloves. Your knowledge of the glovemaking process will be mightily improved by this book. And though it works as a device for a while, it comes eventually to feel as if you are being beaten to death by metaphor.
And that is true of many of the other meticulous digressions too. Roth scratches at the itch of Americana with a relentlessness that borders on autism. Since he is such a brilliant writer this mania is not without its insights - and humour. But it makes for a tough read. And when you finally reach the shocking drama of the final pages you are left feeling robbed of the more direct - but perhaps no less effective - narrative that might have been.
But reading The Human Stain first does throw American Pastoral into relief. The writing in American Pastoral is as magnificent, but the combination of plot and polemic far less satisfying. Whereas The Human Stain races along in a taut tension between the uncovering of secrets and the unmasking of humanity, American Pastoral is an obsessional, almost pathologically forensic, dissection of the American Way, with the plot acting only as a frustratingly episodic driver.
On the face of it this is a tale of how a man who is the perfect embodiment of the American Dream is blighted by the sheer simplicity of his perfection. He is undone by deviancy right on his doorstep. It's a deviancy he is powerless to prevent because it comes from the person to whom he is most devoted: his daughter.
It's a brilliant premise - so brilliant you long for more of the book to focus directly on it. Yet much of what you get instead is gloves. Yes, gloves. Your knowledge of the glovemaking process will be mightily improved by this book. And though it works as a device for a while, it comes eventually to feel as if you are being beaten to death by metaphor.
And that is true of many of the other meticulous digressions too. Roth scratches at the itch of Americana with a relentlessness that borders on autism. Since he is such a brilliant writer this mania is not without its insights - and humour. But it makes for a tough read. And when you finally reach the shocking drama of the final pages you are left feeling robbed of the more direct - but perhaps no less effective - narrative that might have been.
16 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
No-one can write a sentence like Roth; no-one can create characters of such vivid complexity; no-one has the passion of Roth and despite his very apparent misogyny, no-one else has the humanity. He is probably the greatest post-war American novelist and this is his finest book. I have now read it three times and each time the carefulness of the structure reveals itself further. I would give this a hundred stars if I could.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
American nightmare
I draw the inevitable comparison with 'Rabbit, Run', which I liked better. 'American Pastoral' is a meandering tome that doesn't seem to resolve itself. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Puskas
Oh For An Editor
I saw that this was the first of the "Nathan Zuckerman Trilogy". That is about as ominous as seeing 'volume one' as the subtitle to Emerson Lake and Palmer's album 'Works' and in... Read more
Published 7 months ago by MikeDickson
should have been tragic and great - but somehow isn't
I've read all of Philip Roth's earlier work with some pleasure (though Letting Go is quite hard going; and the Great American Novel is clearly not for all). Read more
Published 7 months ago by William Jordan
Bleak But Complelling
Like all Roth's work, this is a fairly bleak and downbeat view of the human condition, but still absolutely compelling from start to finish. And beautifully written of course.
Published 7 months ago by Dan Mollett
verges on a soap opera, but offers a bleak view on US
This is the story of a guy who tries to contruct a perfect life, from sports heroism in high school and marrying a beauty queen, to a huge house in the New Jersey countryside. Read more
Published 12 months ago by rob crawford
American Pastoral
this title was recomended to me by a guy i worked for as a volunteer in a book store. i was, at the time, reading the pumpkin eater, which i had spied among some discarded books,... Read more
Published 14 months ago by Andrew J. Crawshaw
Just for balance
Plenty of people have expressed considered critical reactions to this book. While I could bore you with pages of my own, I'll be merciful. Read more
Published 16 months ago by Nostromo
Truly great
I'm writing this because I was astonished how many reviews gave this masterpiece less than its just desserts. This is one of the greatest books I have ever read. Read more
Published 20 months ago by David Balfe
JM
This really is 'The Emperor's new clothes'. A simple story that would just about stretch to 100 pages, elongated into a weighty tome, for no apparent reason. Read more
Published on 9 Mar 2010 by John Lion
So depressing
Having read and enjoyed Roth's 'The Plot against America' I bought American Pastoral with high expectations.Sadly I was left disappointed. Read more
Published on 7 Jan 2010 by messageinthemoon
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