StudentShare
Contact Us
Sign In / Sign Up for FREE
Search
Go to advanced search...

Philip Roth: The Man and his Work - Essay Example

Cite this document
Summary
Philip Roth is Jewish, and, as is true of most Jewish writers, this aspect of his identity is an important element in his life and work. His parents were born in America but their parents had immigrated to the USA in the nineteenth century, at the time of a wave of European Jewish immigration to the country…
Download full paper File format: .doc, available for editing
GRAB THE BEST PAPER93.1% of users find it useful
Philip Roth: The Man and his Work
Read Text Preview

Extract of sample "Philip Roth: The Man and his Work"

Download file to see previous pages

He taught creative writing at Iowa and Princeton and comparative literature at Pennsylvania before his retirement from teaching in 1992. He had also enlisted in the army and worked for a while in the Washington Public Information Office. Amidst all these varied and perhaps conventional preoccupations, he has always been dedicated to the literary muse, having published his first book in 1959 and his twenty-seventh, Everyman, in 2006, at the age of seventy three. The dust jacket of Everyman lists the more important of the many prizes and awards garnered by Roth since 1997.

For an idea of the number of prizes Roth won before 1997, one would have to visit the web site of "The Philip Roth Society" which lists twenty two awards preceding the Pulitzer Prize of 1997, and ten after it, a total of thirty three from the Paris Review Aga Khan award of 1958 to the PEN/Nabokov award of 2006. Roth probably still cherishes the gesture of the Library of America choosing him as the third living American writer to have his work published in a comprehensive, definitive edition. It would perhaps be an entirely safe bet to predict that within the next few years, the Swedish Academy would doubtless find occasion to award him the one prize that would be a true measure of the universal recognition of his talent and his unstinting dedication to the discipline of writing.

Roth's first book was Goodbye, Columbus, a collection of five stories and a novella, which used wit and irony to depict Jewish life in America after the war. Frederick R. Karl notes that though "often called the quintessential Jewish work", the book is concerned more "with clashes of class and caste than with Jewishness" (567). This remark is surely a tribute to the manner in which a young writer, in his first book, managed to make quintessentially Jewish material serve a broader, more universal social purpose.

It is also noteworthy that this first work, which won Roth the National Book Award for Fiction, was condemned by people within his own community for its rather unflattering portrayal of Jewish life. Societal concerns came to the fore again, in Roth's first full-length novel Letting Go (1962). The 1967 novel When She Was Good is distinguished by the fact that the narrative voice is that of a young woman, a detail rather unusual in Roth's oeuvre. Roth's third novel Portnoy's Complaint (1969) shines a hilarious light on the guilt-ridden solitary sex life of the protagonist, Alexander Portnoy, and made Roth a celebrity, perhaps for the wrong reasons.

Roth, who has been described as "an intensely private man" by the critic Al Alvarez, probes this peculiar predicament of the popular writer's life in books published decades later, notably in Zuckerman Unbound (1981) and Operation Shylock(1993). Frederick Karl stresses that although Portnoy's Complaint tried "to grapple with a Jewish version" of the disorder, it was "also a response to sixties turbulence" generally (576). After Portnoy, Roth made further forays into comedy, coming out with works such as Our Gang (1971) taking off from Richard Nixon, The Breast (1972) an almost surrealistic satire on sexual desire, and The Great American Novel(1973) which sought to satirize not only the work of Frank Norris but also the all-American sport of baseball.

Later, however, Roth's books are seen to become

...Download file to see next pages Read More
Cite this document
  • APA
  • MLA
  • CHICAGO
(“Philip Roth: The Man and his Work Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words”, n.d.)
Philip Roth: The Man and his Work Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words. Retrieved from https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1534330-philip-roth-the-man-and-his-work
(Philip Roth: The Man and His Work Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 Words)
Philip Roth: The Man and His Work Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 Words. https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1534330-philip-roth-the-man-and-his-work.
“Philip Roth: The Man and His Work Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 Words”, n.d. https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1534330-philip-roth-the-man-and-his-work.
  • Cited: 0 times

CHECK THESE SAMPLES OF Philip Roth: The Man and his Work

Phillip Roth and Saul Bellow about Genocide

In his book, he writes about how the Jews who had their solid ground in their culture were treated (Roth, 101).... From the questions that Ozzie asks his teacher, Rabbi, it can be seen that he does not believe in Judaism as much as he is supposed to, yet he is a Jew.... Professor Date Phillip roth and Saul Bellow Introduction Several wars have erupted due to various issues in different countries.... Such acts are committed in order for that particular group of people to cease to exist (roth, 100)....
5 Pages (1250 words) Essay

Locate and compare what it means to be a slave in Phillis Wheatley's poetry and Philip Freneau's poetry

The two poets, Phillis Wheatley and philip Freneau, whose poems are under discussion here to study their attitude to slavery, belong to the same period of eighteenth century.... philip Freneau was a friend of Jefferson, and he is also known the “Father of American Literature”....
4 Pages (1000 words) Essay

Slavery and Race in the USA

Furthermore, historians have indicated that during the early decades of the 19th century, a structured work-gang system was under the practice that included a huge number of slaves that were responsible for the production of cotton and sugar crops in the southern region of the country.... In this regard, after going through other statements of Phillips, it seems that qualities that Phillips indicated in his statement were not limited or used for slave masters only but they represented the racial nature and personalities of people living in southern regions of the country....
5 Pages (1250 words) Essay

Narrative Perspectives of A Distant Shore by Caryl Philips and Kehinde by Emechet

Gabriel is taken in an abandoned house for shelter by his friend Bright, and given food by an English girl, but later he is accused of raping her, which he did not do3.... In Africa, women were mistreated, and rape cases were so high; this is shown when Gabriel remembers witnessing his two sisters being raped.... Also through Gabriel, philip shows the experience by black immigrants in the English society; philip deconstructs this through the lives of Solomon and Dorothy....
6 Pages (1500 words) Essay

Elder abuse and death claims

Reconciling Strengths-based Practice and Mandated Authority in Child Protection work” Social work, vol.... Phillips, middle-aged individuals, suffering from cerebral palsy and learning disabilities recounts his experience in which those who he should have trusted.... Phillips, middle-aged individuals, suffering from cerebral palsy and learning disabilities recounts his experience in which those who he should have trusted as caregivers habitually abused him forcing him to fly from his home....
2 Pages (500 words) Assignment

Strategic Management of Philips NV

This research will begin with the statement that beset with remarkable volatility in terms of almost all aspects of the external business environment, the 21st century has necessitated the corporate world to recognize the importance of change management.... hellip; During research, it has been observed that organizations need to understand the criticality of changes that take place on a continuous basis in their external environments....
11 Pages (2750 words) Case Study

Wealth and Democracy

In his context, Philips supports his argument by developing theoretical and historical analysis of the country.... The paper "Wealth and Democracy" displays the impact of accumulation of wealth on politics and governmental matters.... The book portrays the history of America, it describes the formulation on how the huge fortunes in America came to be, who catalyzed the acquisition of the properties and why America is that rich....
6 Pages (1500 words) Assignment

Product Analysis: Philip Starch Juicer

"Product Analysis: philip Starch Juicer" paper focuses on the product that pioneered the modernist approach to industrial design where a deliberate effort is made to ensure that products are created not just with functionality in mind but also with their form as a major consideration.... It is necessary to focus on the philip Starch Juicer.... The philip stark juicer represents a product with a beautiful design....
6 Pages (1500 words) Case Study
sponsored ads
We use cookies to create the best experience for you. Keep on browsing if you are OK with that, or find out how to manage cookies.
Contact Us