Philip Roth's Rude Truth: The Art of Immaturity

By Ross Posnock

Book Overview

Has anyone ever worked harder and longer at being immature than Philip Roth? The novelist himself pointed out the paradox, saying that after establishing a reputation for maturity with two earnest novels, he "worked hard and long and diligently" to be frivolous--an effort that resulted in the notoriously immature Portnoy's Complaint (1969). Three-and-a-half decades and more than twenty books later, Roth is still at his serious "pursuit of the unserious." But his art of immaturity has itself matured, developing surprising links with two traditions of immaturity--an American one that includes Emerson, Melville, and Henry James, and a late twentieth-century Eastern European one that developed in reaction to totalitarianism. In Philip Roth's Rude Truth --one of the first major studies of Roth's career as a whole--Ross Posnock examines Roth's "mature immaturity" in all its depth and richness. Philip Roth's Rude Truth will force readers to reconsider the narrow categories into which Roth has often been slotted--laureate of Newark, New Jersey; junior partner in the firm Salinger, Bellow, Mailer, and Malamud; Jewish-American regionalist. In dramatic contrast to these caricatures, the Roth who emerges from Posnock's readable and intellectually vibrant study is a great cosmopolitan in the tradition of Henry James and Milan Kundera.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0691116040
• ISBN13: 9780691116044
• Release Date: October 2006
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Length: 328 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.0" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

LITERARY CRITICISM

THE BOOK TAKES ONE DEEPER FROM THE EYES OF A KNOWLEDGEABLE MAN OF LETTERS. I LEARNED A LOT ABOUT PHILLIP ROTH, ESPECIALLY HIS LIFE-LONG EFFORT IN THE PORTRAYAL OF FLAWED HUMAN BEINGS, WHICH WE ALL ARE. I BUY ALL OF ROTH'S BOOKS- ENTERTAINING AND DEEP. BECAUSE OF THE TRUTH OF THE FAILED INDIVIDUAL, ESPECIALLY AFTER 1963 WHEN MY OWN WRITING SHOWS THE END OF JUDEOCHRISTIANITY, GOD IS BACK TO WORKING WITH THE US- GROUPS, COMMUNITIES, NATIONS AND INTENATIONAL. ROTH HAS MADE THIS SHIFT CLEARER TO UNDERSTAND.The New Pentateuch: Creating "Our Nation Is God"

Terrific read on Roth and his Emersonian insouciance

This is the only study on Roth that centers on what Roth readers have found most entertaining in his work: his rudeness at the alter of bourgeois pieties. More striking, though, is Posnock's linking of Roth's rudeness to Emerson, a connection that is itself an instance of the audacity it is intended to clarify.

The Best and Best Written Criticism of Roth

As a committed devotee of Roth's work, I've read a number of articles and critiques of his literature and its meaning, but none compare to the expansiveness, clarity, and insight that one can derive from Posnock's book. While most works on Roth tend to focus on categorizing him narrowly as a Jewish American author, Posnock's work sees him in a novel light - Roth is part of a tradition of authors on both sides of the Atlantic who write about the importance of immaturity, silliness, and flouting convention. It is this lens, perhaps even more than a particular Jewish/ethnic lens that, in my opinion, offers the most insight into Portnoy's Complaint, The Counterlife, The Human Stain, and his other great works. By taking into account his literary genealogy, one also learns a lot about Henry James, Raplh Waldo Emerson, and Milan Kundera. Besides being impeccably researched and carefully (and not exaggeratedly) argued, Posnock has a talent for excellent, even beautiful, writing. This is the kind of style and caliber of writing that I would enjoy even if I had no interest in Roth or his canon. The work as a whole is outstanding and I highly recommend it for anyone interested in Roth's work or in a model of sterling scholarship and writing.

Every day a new day to dawn. This Roth is but a morning star

Ross Posnock makes a new reading of the work of Philip Roth. He focuses on the idea of 'immaturity' and through it links Roth to literary traditions and writers to whom he is not normally connected. Perhaps most notably he connects Roth with the writers of the American Renaissance (1850-55) Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman, Melville, Hawthorne the giants of the American Tradition. Posnock shows how Roth's refusal to accept the inhibiting restrictions of maturity free him to make an incredible imaginative effort, one which remarkably unlike that of so many American writers, does in fact have a 'second act' Posnock also links Roth with the world of Eastern European writers most notably Milan Kundera. Posnock finds Roth to be that rare American writer who has gone from strength to greater strength. For him the first rank of Roth's work consists in "Portnoy's Complaint" (1969) "The Counterlife" (1986) "Sabbath's Theatre " (1995) and "The Human Stain" ( 2000) I myself have a different sense of the Roth canon and believe that his most recent work "Everyman" is at a level only "Portnoy" can match. Posnock does what a good literary critic should do - expands our sense of the richness of meaning of the work. This is a welcome addition to the growing critical literature on the work of an American master.