NEW SCARE CITY

It's a fictional streetscape we wander, here, a metropolis whose buildings, boulevards, and back alleys are in a constant state of flux. This is every place, and yet, no place at all - a city of dreams and a dream of a city.

Here, we explore the life and work of Ivan Illich and his circle of collaborators. There's no comprehensive index to the articles published, but we invite you to use the Search box, to the left, and to explore the Archive links that appear at the bottom of each page. Comments are welcomed.

Monday, November 02, 2009

More on 'The Humbling'

The "New Statesman" has weighed in on The Humbling, Philip Roth's latest book, and it's pretty much all thumbs down.


Writes Jason Cowley, editor of the UK-based magazine:

"The Humbling shares most of the preoccupations of Roth's recent fiction: the sorrows and loneliness of old age, illness, the poignancy of lingering sexual desire, and so on. It clearly wants to be read as a companion piece to his impressive late works about the inescapable senselessness of death. Yet it is at times so ridiculous, so stylistically careless and shabbily executed, the characters so thin and artificial, that you think, at first, the whole thing must be an elaborate joke or parody, or else an exercise in character assassination - a novel written by one of Philip Roth's avenging doubles, hypothetical selves or alter egos, whose sole mission is to besmirch the reputation of the celebrated American author we know as "Philip Roth"."


No comments:

Powered By Blogger

Moi

Santa Rosa, California, United States
Writer, photographer, music fan; father and husband living in northern Calif.