Philip Roth's fiction has often explored the human need to demolish, to challenge, to oppose, to pull apart. Now, writing with deep understanding, with enormous power and scope and great storytelling energy, he focuses on the counterforce: the longing for an ordinary life. Seymour 'Swede' Levov - a legendary high school athlete, a devoted family man, a hard worker, the prosperous inheritor of his father's glove factory - comes of age in thriving, triumphant, postwar America. He has a beautiful wife - Miss New Jersey 1949 - and a lively, precocious daughter, Merry. She is the apple of his eye until America begins to run amok in the turbulent 1960s and Merry grows up to be a revolutionary terrorist bent on destroying her father's paradise. With vigorous realism, one of America's most esteemed writers takes us back to the conflicts and violent transitions of the 1960s. This is a book about loving - and hating - America. It's a book about wanting to belong- and refusing to belong - to America. It sets the desire for an American pastoral - a respectable life of space, calm, order, optimism, and achievement - against the indigenous American berserk.
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With his last three books, each of them published in the 1990s, Philip Roth has won three majorliterary awards. In 1991, for Patrimony, he won the National Book Critics Circle Award. In 1993, for Operation Shylock, he won the PEN/Faulkner Award. In 1995, for Sabbath's Theater, he won the National Book award. Mr. Roth was born in Newark, New Jersey, in 1993. He was educated at Bucknell Univerisity and the University of Chicago. Since 1972 he has lived in Connecticut. American Pastoral is his twenty-second book.
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Librería: Crappy Old Books, Barry, Reino Unido
Hardback. Condición: Good. Welcome to American Pastoral (1997) by Philip Roth (Jonathan Cape), ISBN 9780224050005 ? a novel that takes the phrase ?the American dream? and, with polite precision, picks it up, turns it over, and shows you the cracks underneath the glossy paint. On the surface, it starts like a myth of uncomplicated success. Enter Seymour ?Swede? Levov : golden-boy athlete, handsome, admired, married into the right kind of life, running the family business, living in the sort of America that believes problems can be solved with good manners, hard work, and a nice lawn. It?s pastoral in the sense of ?everything is orderly, prosperous, and aesthetically pleasing.? And then Roth does what Roth does: he introduces history, politics, violence, and the nasty fact that real life has no interest in being a symbol. The book is told through the lens of Nathan Zuckerman , Roth?s recurring observer-narrator, who reconstructs the Swede?s life and tries to understand how a seemingly perfect story curdles. The central rupture is the Swede?s daughter, Merry , whose radicalisation and actions tear the family apart. What follows isn?t a simple ?tragedy strikes? plot. It?s a slow, furious, deeply intelligent excavation of a life ? and of a country ? where private hopes collide with public turmoil. The irony of the title is the whole point: this isn?t a pastoral. It?s what happens when you try to live a pastoral in a nation that keeps changing the weather. Roth sets the story against the background of postwar American confidence sliding into the chaos of the 1960s and beyond ? social unrest, political violence, culture wars, identity, shame, and the constant pressure of appearances. The Swede tries to be decent, steady, reasonable. Roth?s novel is partly about how fragile those virtues can feel when the world stops rewarding them. It?s also a book about misunderstanding ? between generations, between parents and children, between spouses, between the public story people tell and the private one they can barely admit to themselves. Roth is ruthless about the lies we need in order to function, and compassionate about why we cling to them anyway. The writing is sharp, funny in a dark way, and devastating when it chooses to be. It?s a novel that can sound like it?s calmly describing events and then suddenly hit you with a line that makes you sit back and stare. This Jonathan Cape edition brings a certain satisfying heft ? the sense of a serious modern classic in a proper hardback guise. Condition: Good , meaning it?s been read and handled ? which makes sense, because this is the kind of book people argue about, underline, and press into someone?s hands with, ?Just read it.? Expect some honest wear, but it?s still completely ready to do its job: unsettle you, move you, and leave you thinking about America as both idea and accident. Perfect for: readers who like big, intelligent novels about society and family, anyone interested in the collision of private life and public history, fans of Roth?s voice: exacting, unsparing, darkly comic, fiercely alive, and people who suspect that ?pastoral? is always one headline away from implosion. Sold by Crappy Old Books , naturally ? because where else would a 1997 Jonathan Cape edition of Roth?s great American unravelling end up, if not waiting patiently to remind the next reader that the dream is real? and so is the fallout. Nº de ref. del artículo: 5501
Cantidad disponible: 1 disponibles
Librería: Solr Books, Lincolnwood, IL, Estados Unidos de America
Condición: very_good. This books is in Very good condition. There may be a few flaws like shelf wear and some light wear. Nº de ref. del artículo: BCV.0224050001.VG
Cantidad disponible: 1 disponibles
Librería: Greener Books, London, Reino Unido
Hardcover. Condición: Used; Very Good. **SHIPPED FROM UK** We believe you will be completely satisfied with our quick and reliable service. All orders are dispatched as swiftly as possible! Buy with confidence! Greener Books. Nº de ref. del artículo: 4576968
Cantidad disponible: 1 disponibles
Librería: Bramble Books, Ipswich, Reino Unido
Softcover. Condición: Very Good. 1st Edition. Card covers. Text block edge has a bit of foxing, otherwise clean pages. Firm unread binding. Uncorrected proof copy. Professional seller. All pictures are of the actual book that is for sale. Books are dispatched in cardboard packaging and dust jackets are placed in removable protective covers. Nº de ref. del artículo: s19048
Cantidad disponible: 1 disponibles
Librería: Books & Bobs, Deeside, FLINT, Reino Unido
Hardcover. Condición: Near Fine. Clean black boards, with gilt titles to spine and an unclipped DW. A tight, bright and clean copy with no inscriptions and no foxing. 423pp. (16.5x24.5cm). Please contact us for any more information. Nº de ref. del artículo: 7152
Cantidad disponible: 1 disponibles
Librería: Toscana Books, AUSTIN, TX, Estados Unidos de America
Hardcover. Condición: new. Excellent Condition.Excels in customer satisfaction, prompt replies, and quality checks. Nº de ref. del artículo: Scanned0224050001
Cantidad disponible: 1 disponibles
Librería: BennettBooksLtd, San Diego, NV, Estados Unidos de America
Hardcover. Condición: New. In shrink wrap. Looks like an interesting title! Nº de ref. del artículo: Q-0224050001
Cantidad disponible: 1 disponibles
Librería: P J MCALEER, BELFAST, Reino Unido
Hardcover. Condición: Fine. Estado de la sobrecubierta: As New. 1st Edition. Book and cover in fine condition,never read .see photos 1st/1st. Nº de ref. del artículo: 152
Cantidad disponible: 1 disponibles