Everything is over for Simon Axler, the protagonist of Philip Roth s startling new book. One of the leading American stage actors of his generation, now in his sixties, he has lost his magic, his talent, and his assurance. His Falstaff and Peer Gynt and Vanya, all his great roles, "are melted into air, into thin air." When he goes onstage he feels like a lunatic and looks like an idiot. His confidence in his powers has drained away; he imagines people laughing at him; he can no longer pretend to be someone else. "Something fundamental has vanished." His wife has gone, his audience has left him, his agent can t persuade him to make a comeback.
Into this shattering account of inexplicable and terrifying self-evacuation bursts a counterplot of unusual erotic desire, a consolation for a bereft life so risky and aberrant that it points not toward comfort and gratification but to a yet darker and more shocking end. In this long day s journey into night, told with Roth s inimitable urgency, bravura, and gravity, all the ways that we convince ourselves of our solidity, all our life s performances talent, love, sex, hope, energy, reputation are stripped off.
The Humbling is Roth s thirtieth book. |
|
 I don't get it |
| Review Date: March 6, 2010 |
| Reviewer: G. Henson, |
| I consider myself reasonably well-read, but I admit without reservation that this book is beyond my understanding. I enjoyed the first chapter, was excited by where the second chapter might be headed, and totally bewildered by the last. Not a book I would recommend to anyone. |
Uninteresting characters trudging through a predictable plot
|
| Review Date: March 2, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Ethan M. Cordray, Jefferson City, MO USA |
This is the first Philip Roth novel I've read. I picked it as an entry point, since it was short and recent and I figured it would give me a taste of his style. I certainly hope that it isn't representative of his work.
In fiction, there's nothing wrong with having unlikable characters, as long as they are interesting. The main characters here aren't. Simon is a washed up actor who seems incapable of any emotion besides self-pity. Pegeen is a cipher, not having much in the way of emotions that the reader can understand, apparently looking for some sort of fulfillment through sexual novelty and never finding anything in particular. These are not necessarily bad *ideas* for characters, but Roth doesn't explore them or flesh them out into anything interesting. Everything he says about them can fit into two sentences like the ones I just wrote.
The plot is simple, tedious, and highly predictable. Simon loses his acting chops, the only thing he cares about, and becomes suicidal. Pegeen comes into his life and they have a lot of weird sex. Then she leaves, and he gets suicidal again, this time enough to succeed. The end. Roth telegraphs every motion well in advance, not making an effort to to depict the action as anything besides a fait accompli. Each particular scene is the same way, playing out predictably from first sentence to last. Again, such a simple and obvious plot might still work if the reader had any interest in the characters. But Roth never gives us any particular reason to care what happens to them.
The stylistic choices do little to help matters. I found myself skipping past the pages of explicit sex, not because they were pornographically titillating, but because they were at once tedious and disgusting. Roth doesn't seem to realize that boring characters having a boring conversation while wearing strap-on dildos are still boring characters having a boring conversation.
There were a few interesting parts of the book, mostly thanks to minor characters. Simon's agent comes for a visit and has as good a conversation as is possible between a real character and a lump of wood. There's a good short story that could be made from this scene. The young woman torn between helplessness and vengeance whom Simon meets in the sanitarium grabs the reader's feelings. I'd much rather read a novel about her.
But then, I'd prefer read any number of novels with characters I can care about, rather than this one about rough character concepts trudging through the outline of a plot. |
King Lear Revisited
|
| Review Date: February 26, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Howard Paul Burgess, Bryan, TX USA |
THE HUMBLING is about Simon, once a great actor but now reduced to a shadow of his former self. He's lost his confidence on stage: this humbling experience has led himself to an existence in isolation.
As we Baby Boomers enter our sixties (dang, like ten minutes ago we were living in The Sixties) there's a resonance to Simon's dilemma. This is not, as some have suggested, vanity on his part. Acting isn't just what he does, it's who he is. He's lost his inner self, his zeitgeist.
This is powerful material, and Roth makes the most of it. He'll be seventy-seven next month, and age doesn't seem to have diminished him. He's still brings insight to the situation and creates characters you'd like to know more deeply.
Once again, though, Roth falls into a trap of his own making. Simon becomes involved with a young woman he's known since her birth. She's more than twenty years younger than he is, and she begins a passionate affair that inspires Roth to indulge in what is often called Purple Prose. Simon's escapades in the bedroom with this young woman are graphic. This portion of the book could have been called Everything You Never Wanted to Know about Sex and Were Glad You Never Asked. When this odd couple picks up a woman and takes her home for a three way, the book veers toward farce.
Worse yet, Roth makes the young lady a reformed Lesbian. Retired? Former? It's hard to find the right word. This seems to be a setup for a burlesque joke, but we never get a punch line. I'd have like for Pegeen to have been more developed, a much stronger character with more detailed drives and goals of her own.
Roth's habit of including graphic erotica in his books is like having a much loved friend whose visits you look forward to, except for his insistence on playing the accordion after dinner.
OK, Mr. Roth, we're all grownups here. You don't have to be naughty to make a good impression on us.
Concentrate on what you know best. There are a million hacks out there who can write that sort of thing. Long before I was born Cole Porter wrote that "Writers who once knew much better words/Now only use four-letter words/Writing prose..." He must have been anticipating Roth's novels. |
Roth Finally Speaks Out Against Sexism
|
| Review Date: February 12, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Colometa, Ithaca, NY |
While Philip Roth's latest novel The Humbling is definitely not on the same level as his earlier masterpieces American Pastoral and The Human Stain, its is still pretty good. Written in Roth's luminous style, The Humbling tells a story of Simon Axler, an aging actor who loses his capacity to act and is plunged into a depression as a result. His wife leaves him, and Axler sees himself as condemned to loneliness for the rest of his days. Then, he starts an affair with Pegeen, a lesbian who is 25 years younger than he is. When Pegeen gets bored with their relationship and leaves, Axler is devastated.
This novel offers a profound critique of the male chauvinist way of thinking and of the problems it causes to the men who try to hold on to the obsolete macho ideology. Axler treats Pegeen as a voiceless, malleable doll, who needs to be transformed into a version of womanhood he considers to be acceptable: "All he was doing was helping Pegeen to be a woman he would want instead of a woman another woman would want." Understandably, his efforts to "cure" Pegeen from being a lesbian through fancy clothes and expensive jewelry fail.
In his efforts to analyze his relationship with an independent, self-sufficient, intellectual woman from the vantage point of outdated chauvinistic beliefs, Axler makes himself look utterly pathetic. he expects Pegeen's parents to be happy about their daughter's relationship with him because he is rich and can 'take care of her', whatever that means: "Here is this eminent man with a lot of money who's going to take care of her. After all, she's not getting any younger herself. She settles down with someone who's achieved something in life - what's so wrong with that?" Later on, Axler expresses a belief that Pegeen is involved with him because of his erstwhile fame as an actor.
Axler forgets that, unlike decades ago, an educated professional woman has no need to be with a person of any age or any gender because of money, the imaginary need "to settle down," or because she needs anybody to take care of her. What Axler fails to understand - and what costs him very dearly in the end - is that Pegeen's only reason to be with him (or with anybody else) is her desire. Gone are the times when women like Pegeen needed to attach themselves to an older man for prestige, money, or protection. Today, a woman who makes her own living can choose the sexual partner(s) she wants based on nothing but her own feelings and desires.
Pegeen is not the only woman Axler misjudges on the basis of his outdated sexist beliefs. Sybil, a woman he meets in a hospital, is for him "helpless, frail, and child-like." He misunderstands Sybil's inner strength and determination and ends up completely clueless about her.
In his long career as a writer, Roth often was criticized for the sexism of his novels. In my opinion, The Humbling is the writer's attempt to atone novelistically for that.
|
The Humbling by Philip Roth
|
| Review Date: February 11, 2010 |
| Reviewer: scott89119, Whittier, CA |
The Humbling is about an aging, depressive actor's winter romance with a lesbian family friend 25 years his junior. This is set against the metaphorical milieu of the theatre stage, as the protagonist (Simon Axler) is a well-known actor who has since fallen off the radar. The book charts the highs and lows of the ultimately doomed relationship, and how it forces a vain and egocentric man to come to gritty terms with the ugly side of the real world.
Unfortunately Roth doesn't really deliver here, which is a disappointment considering that he is our best living novelist. All of his trademarks are here- smooth prose, a heightened delineation of character, and *colorful bedroom scenes- but the piece is too short and ultimately restrained to make anything enjoyable. Some reviewers have lauded it as being "tight" and "controlled" which I understand, however the end result simply isn't gratifying and worked-out enough to make its restraint praiseworthy. It is still an entertaining story and a very fast read, but dark throughout and filled with a biting cynicism towards old age and regret. I prefer Roth when he doesn't take life quite so seriously. |
|
No video reviews found for this product.
Comment