The Batman, emphasis on "The Man," also: Watchmen trailer

No thanks to you bozos, I finally got around to seeing The Dark Knight, and of course as a fan of what Christopher Nolan is doing with the character, generally, I found it to be yet another very powerful and effective superhero movie (does anybody besides me notice the ratio of good superhero movies to bad superhero movies these days? No wonder they're a sure bet at the box office these days--it seems every other summer movie can't resist being labeled a mixed bag at best). Heath Ledger was extremely good, I thought, and definitely the best Joker I've ever seen on screen (don't count me as a fan of Jack Nicholson's impression), even as his portrayal didn't exactly match the conception I had of him from the comics. It was also fun and somewhat novel to see a movie version that argued basically the inverse of what V For Vendetta was going for: that, as Thomas Hobbes suggested, life is nasty and filled with awful people, and only self-appointed guardians of order, legitimately elected or not, can keep us from tearing ourselves apart. Much has been written about how the Joker has been remade as a political terrorist a la Zarqawi or whoever, and it's sort of interesting to see the formerly anti-establishment Batman teaming up with the cops to restore capitalism and democracy, albeit not by playing by the books (then again, who ever did?). I was also happy to see the Joker providing a true-life example of "the prisoner's dilemma" for us to witness--as a screenplay device, it's kind of hoary, and the payoff is even worse, but the idea of the Joker as a amateur political scientist strikes me as gold.

Some things bugged me, but I don't know if they qualify as actual criticisms of the movie. The film brings up a lot of properly weighty themes that are discarded without a moment's notice--the Joker-Batman inverted psychoses theory first posited (as far as I know) by Alan Moore; the interesting notion that Batman is indirectly responsible for most of the supervillains who hang around Gotham City; that Two-Face follows this tragic arc and remains, unlike the rest of the characters, unredeemed. I never felt, for all the speechifying done by various characters (including countless moments where Joker says something to the effect of, "I'm just like you, Batman, I'm the yin to your yang, Batman, you are order and I am chaos, blah blah blah"), any of this was satisfactorily resolved. When Two-Face finally gets involved in the action, as fearsome as he looks, it seems that he is supposed to represent the new breed of evil in Gotham--and he doesn't seem that bad. The conversation he and Joker have doesn't make any sense. Additionally, I felt the film crossed the line with having Batman devise some sort of widespread sonar device that could determine the location of anyone with a cell phone, even if it's meant to be temporary. Has it come to the point where audiences can only trust Batman if he is the superhero embodiment of Big Brother, working with law enforcement to take down unabashed anarchists? I don't think this is an encouraging development (and what would Batman have done with V?). I was pleasantly surprised by the ending, because it seems that Nolan is trying to set up something not frequently explored in the comics, that of Batman operating completely outside of the law and, indeed, in opposition to it. It would be cool to see a movie where Batman fought police brutality or battled war profiteers by waging corporate warfare as Bruce Wayne (there was an excellent arc in Morrison's JLA where Batman "buys out" Lex Luthor in order to stop one of his schemes). Won't happen though. The way the movie ends, I like to think it would dovetail nicely into an arc involving Killer Croc or Solomon Grundy (Batman has to relocate in the sewers) or maybe Catwoman. Then, maybe in the future, we can get a Superman team-up?

But let's not get into that. Let's talk about this Watchmen trailer.



I, like many millions of Americans, am a big fan of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen. Many people like to say that it is the greatest comic book story of all time, and while I am trying to slowly wean myself from making grand pronouncements like that, I think it is absolutely essential reading for just about anyone. Certainly, if I were to ever teach a class on postmodern fiction, I would include that as required reading, no question. As a statement on industrial imperialism, compounded by the world's first US superpower employing people with literal superpowers, and the resulting fecundity of cold war resentment, it is without peer, and I honestly believe that, even with all the superheroes running around. The layers of detail and exposition warrant many repeated readings, and the ending is appropriately (given the times) morally ambiguous: I've had long arguments with people concerning whether or not we felt Rorschach's actions at the end were justified.

I feel as if Watchmen fans are now divided in two halves: those who can't wait for Zack Snyder's movie adaptation and those who are uneasy with the notion of Watchmen being made into a film, particularly by Zack"300" Snyder. You can count me among those who felt that 300 was an absolutely loathsome movie, which, if not an outright gesture of support for the continuing War on Terror was sufficiently xenophobic, homophobic, and full of enough macho self-posturing to make me want to gag. Additionally, the fact that Alan Moore explicitly stated that a movie cannot and should not be made of Watchmen was enough to give me additional pause.

Funny fact: I was delighted to find that Moore and I have similar feelings about 300, per an interview he did recently with Entertainment Weekly:

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Don't you have the slightest curiosity about what Watchmen director Zack Snyder is doing with your work?
ALAN MOORE: I would rather not know.

He's supposed to be a very nice guy.
He may very well be, but the thing is that he's also the person who made 300. I've not seen any recent comic book films, but I didn't particularly like the book 300. I had a lot of problems with it, and everything I heard or saw about the film tended to increase [those problems] rather than reduce them: [that] it was racist, it was homophobic, and above all it was sublimely stupid. I know that that's not what people going in to see a film like 300 are thinking about but...I wasn't impressed with that.... I talked to [director] Terry Gilliam in the '80s, and he asked me how I would make Watchmen into a film. I said, ''Well actually, Terry, if anybody asked me, I would have said, 'I wouldn't.''' And I think that Terry [who aborted his attempted adaptation of the book] eventually came to agree with me. There are things that we did with Watchmen that could only work in a comic, and were indeed designed to show off things that other media can't.

He makes good points, and he admits he may be making generalizations.

Anyway, I saw the trailer, and I couldn't help but be taken aback by how strikingly similar to the comic it is, at least in terms of angles: in fact, I was downright moved by the proceedings. I'm not convinced yet this is a good idea, but who knows? It was a good choice to have them play the Smashing Pumpkins song "The End is the Beginning is the End," as it fits the heavily stylized industrial atmosphere, as well as give it an updated 80's flavor (although, it should be pointed out, that song was written by Billy Corgan not for any album but for the soundtrack for Batman & Robin--a bad omen if you think about it). The Owlship, I was pleased to see, looks very cool. Nite Owl now looks kind of like a doughy Batman ripoff, and it's kind of silly to see him dropkicking some prisoners, but whatever. Silk Spectre now wears less clothes, no surprise there. Dr. Manhattan looks very cool, and very similar to the comics, as does the Comedian. Ozymandius unfortunately looks pretty underwhelming, but maybe that's part of the point. My beloved Rorschach (who, incidentally, shares Mendelson's birthday), looks spiffy as well, although I'm dubious about how Snyder is going to try translating the constantly shifting patterns on his mask--having them change on screen gives it a slightly different effect than having them change from panel to panel.

Anyway, it's an addictive trailer. I will probably see it when it comes out, but consider me, like Moore, to be skeptical. Hurm.

An open plea

Does someone want to see The Dark Knight with me, someone who preferably is already in Ames?

There's no way you will be interested in this

My class schedule for next year, for those of you interested. In case you are confused, I go to a liberal arts school that's divided into nine "blocks," which translates into four classes one semester and five in the other. Looking back on my college career, I am proud to say that I never took a block off, and I never skipped class, not even when I was sick (not that I ever got sick). Unfortunately, the days when one got rewarded for this are now over, and I have to depend on my intellect to reap me benefits. I'm screwed.

1. Senior Seminar: Colonial Literature and Postcolonial Theory
2. Intermediate French
3. American Survey
4. Virginia Woolf
5. Jazz Improvisation
6. Topic: Who Owns Music? The Practice and Politics of Musical Borrowing
7. Advanced Critical Writing
8. Race, Sex, and the Constitution
9. Critical Theory

I know what you are thinking: Is this Sacks guy so hardcore that he is going to end his college career with Critical Theory? Damn right. I couldn't fit it anywhere else.

Some other notes:
-Regarding Intermediate French, I'm screwed. Part of a liberal arts education is that you need to take a requisite number of classes outside your major, which includes a language. Technically the only class you need to pass is one language class at the 205 level, but unfortunately you need to either make it through three beginning classes or pass into a higher level by taking a test at the beginning of freshman year. I passed into French 103, which meant I would have to take two classes. I took 103 back freshman year, but for numerous reasons I have had to keep pushing back when I would take 205. Now, I don't remember any French. This is bad news. I feel especially bad considering the amount of friends, particularly from high school, who have gone and lived in other countries and learned other languages. For some reason, I have tried to remain willfully ignorant of other languages, in part because I never really liked the French language to begin with. I wonder why I never went abroad, anywhere. I guess I couldn't imagine leaving my little liberal arts alcove, but now I'm gonna have to leave, or end up like Eric Stoltz in Kicking and Screaming (see that movie if you haven't).


-Jazz Improvisation is looking to be somewhat hardcore, although I'm sure I can take it way better than most people. I wonder if my teacher will be down for some jazz fusion in the form of, I dunno, Jeff Beck's Blow By Blow.

-I'm only taking Virginia Woolf because it's with the master of all things Woolf, and at Cornell there are disappointingly few classes devoted to a singular author (one on Milton, if I remember, and two on Shakespeare).

-I found out not long ago that a professor of some repute who recently left Cornell (and whose name is not really that googleable but I will withhold it, just in case), talked a bunch of shit about me to a friend of mine. He took great issue with my article on Mark Steyn, which angers me only because I consider that article/interview to be the only worthwhile thing I did on that paper, and he proceeded to tear me up for not being sufficiently critical of Steyn and Cornell for inviting a public speaker that a) didn't have old-school scholarly credentials, and b) maintained that multiculturalism is a deterrent on American progress. I felt like writing an angry E-Mail but I abstained, as surely he is a far superior rhetoritician. Still, I swear to God, if I were ever to become a professor I would not end up being a knee-jerk peacenik like so much of the faculty. I mean at least they can entertain a speaker's presence for a day or so.
-Jesse Helms was a prick.

Also, I need to consider giving this blog a bit more oomph. Those who have known me or seen me will understand when I say I have no concept of visual aesthetics, and I will pay someone to help redesign (and maybe get a guest blogger up in here, anyone interested?*) If some of my bloggier friends (Mendy, Jim, Ricky) want to work something out I would be glad and somewhat relieved.

Oh yeah, since Mendy posted a link to my last.fm meme I am bound by my code of honor to do the same for him: Here. I think his answers ended up being a lot more interesting then mine, but then he got lucky.

*Not Juell.

Quotes, for the sake of wasting time

"These seances are intercut with concert footage, during which the band typically sings the lyrics through once and then gets mired in endless loops of instrumental repetition that seem positioned somewhere between mantras and autism. The music is shapeless, graceless, and built from rhythm, not melody; it is amusing, given the undisciplined sound, to eavesdrop later as they argue in a van about whether they all were following the same arrangement."
-Roger Ebert, on the music of Neil Young & Crazy Horse

"I always treat life and death with respect, but most people don't...Look, I love the Coen brothers; we all studied at NYU. But they treat life as a joke. Ha ha ha. A joke. It's like, 'Look how they killed that guy! Look how blood squirts out the side of his head!' I see things different than that."
-Spike Lee, offering the most ridiculous generalization masquerading as criticism I've heard in a while, and I'm not even that big of a Coen brothers fan.

"astenou6 you's da faygot spiderman is teh greatest marvel superhero character ever not because of his powers but, because of what he represents your to much of a noob to get taht!"
-Youtube user Ace48071, spreading the Spider-Man gospel in ways I could only hope to emulate.

"So here is the problem. Homo sapiens has been on the planet for 100,000 years, but apparently for more than 95,000 of these years he accomplished virtually nothing. No real art, no writing, no inventions, no culture, no civilization. How is this possible? Were our ancestors, otherwise mentally and physically undistinguishable [sic] from us, such blithering idiots that they couldn't figure out anything other than the arts of primitive warfare?"
-Dinesh D'Souza, undeservedly proud of his new counter-theory against "the atheists" claiming that it makes no sense that God would only choose to intervene in human affairs sporadically over the last 5,000 years (I generally have little regard for anything anyone says over the internet, and I include myself, but I was heartened to see people on D'Souza's site ripping apart this argument fairly readily).

Oh snap, you been shylock'd!

In case you haven't heard, it's the new Fox news game show: respond to any attacks on Fox News' character by showing ridiculously Jewed-up pictures of the perpetrators. This is what Steve Doocy and co. tried to do on Fox & Friends in a segment in which Doocy was complaining about some attack against Fox News leveled by The New York Times. So they showed an obviously doctored photo of the reporter in question, Jacques Steinberg. Compare below (courtesy Media Matters):

Seems kind of weird. They also took down another "attacker," Steven Reddicliffe:

What the hell? The question isn't whether or not Fox News actually did doctor these photos: obviously, they did, and a spokeswoman for the company said that it is common practice on cable news networks to photoshop pictures of people, but why do it this way? First of all, this is some terrible, me-level photoshopping. Second of all, it looks like pictures straight out of 30s German propaganda, and not even the good stuff, like Leni Riefenstahl. Can you imagine them taking a picture of, say, Al Sharpton, and doctoring some huge red lips on it? Shameful.

And yet some people say that anti-Semitism is not a factor, or is unimportant compared to various other forms of prejudice. As if it's a contest.

Vanity Fair has gotten into the game, posting a bunch of ridiculous photos of Fox News personalities, although in this case I would imagine it would not be in their best interest to shylock somebody already Jewish, like Bill Kristol. Speaking of Bill Kristol, I just saw the movie Arguing the World and I would like to talk about it at some point. Not that it has anything to do with Bill, but the deep lack of respect Irving Kristol's peers now hold for him is telling, I think.

Philip Roth, Part VI: The End

So, only three more books, all of them having nothing to do with any Kepeshes, Zuckermans, or Roths. The journey was fun and immensely helpful in regards to my honors stuff, and I hope to do this again with another author. But which one? Probably a white male. I fear I will spend the rest of my life feeling that I am woefully under read. I can now carefully consider myself a Roth scholar, but I want more. Indignation comes out in October.

Sabbath's Theater: If I were to choose one book from Roth's oeuvre to read again immediately, this one might be it, despite its comparatively massive length and the pallor of decay and gloom hanging over it. Make no mistake, this is an absolutely perfect novel that distills all the best aspects of Roth: comical scatology; spot-on dialogue; a feel for even the most minor of characters; an ability to pace; and a predilection to do new, interesting and novel things with the form. He squeezes every last drop of narrative potential from what could have been a very ordinary story about an aging, disgraced puppeteer near the end of his life, mourning the loss by cancer of a very special mistress and yearning to redo the whole thing again. Mickey Sabbath is an incredibly disgusting and vile, yet he is a lovable character, and his relationship with the doomed mistress, Drenka, is as touching as it is vomit-inducing (I swear, I don't know how he does this stuff so well). There are a good dozen or so brilliant moments that I feel like rereading immediately, including a transcript of a phone sex conversation (can't think of any better one off the top of my head), a Ulysses-esque digression imagined by Sabbath on a subway, Sabbath trying in vain to buy some vodka so that a woman he met at a rehab facility--where he was supposed to be visiting his wife--would sleep with him, Sabbath revisiting his home, the description of various depraved sexual practices that Sabbath and Drenka engage in without abandon, and several others. This is a very special book that packs an emotional wallop right to the very end, and has probably the best opening and closing lines of any Roth book I can think of. This book is about as depraved as Roth got, and it isn't for the faint of heart, but it's as moving a character study as I believe Roth is capable of constructing.

Shop Talk: Not much to say about this book: like Reading Myself and Others, this is straight non-fiction (a rarity for the author), although this time Roth is smart enough to take himself out of the equation, mostly, and presents a series of mostly interviews and appreciations of authors he admires. I found this book only intermittently interesting as I had yet to read many of the authors he interviews in this book, but it's always nice to hear Roth talk about how enamored he became with the artistic scene in Czechoslovakia (the book contains interviews with both Milan Kundera and Ivan Klima, both of ramble on intelligently about the positives and negatives in choosing to represent a society that is so hostile to open ideas and art) and also how he views himself in the pantheon of 20th century Jewish writers, via his appreciations of Saul Bellow and Bernard Malamud (there's also a quick interview with Isaac Bashevis Singer--having read Singer, I really don't see how they would have much in common, but they are respectful). It should also be noted that his interview with Aharon Applefeld showed up almost verbatim in Operation Shylock. This is not necessary reading by any means unless you happen to be interested in the authors Roth is talking about, which in most cases I was.

Everyman: This book was quite a doozy to end on, and I'm sort of sorry I chose to end it this way. This is a very short and powerful read, although it doesn't offer much beyond this very novel notion that it is a biography (the protagonist of which is nameless) that consists entirely of Everyman's illnesses: Roth will mention in fleeting how his character lived 25 years with no health problems and move on to the next operation or hospital visit. The intent is obvious, to convey the horror and depression of someone who knows he is inching ever closer to the end of his life, and cursing the failings of his body and mind. As one can imagine, this does not make for happy reading. There is virtually nothing in the way of humor in this book, a rarity among Roth's works, and the descriptions of Everyman's few infidelities aren't terrible interesting compared with what we know Roth is capable of. There are many powerful sequences, but I suspect Roth intends them to be secondary to the overall mood of the piece, which is to convey his own anxiety about growing old and seeing his body fail (I'm told that Roth, unlike his older characters, is more or less in excellent health). This would have made a fitting epitaph had Roth chosen to end it this way, particularly the scene where he goes to the graveyard to visit the grave of his mother and father. I felt this passage to be absolutely heartbreaking:

Aloud, he said to them: "I'm 71. Your boy is 71." "Good, you lived," his mother replied. And his father said, "Look back and atone for what you can atone for, and make the best of what you have left."

I don't think that this is a sentiment that can only be understood by 71-year olds. If there's anyone in any of Roth's book that says anything worth taking to heart, it's Everyman's father.

Philip Roth, Part V

As promised, I continue. At this point in my journey, I was reading pretty voraciously, at the rate of about one book every two days. I recommend to everyone trying to do something like that for a month, but after that it can get to be a problem. I was also plagued by headaches during this time, and still am.

The Facts: A Novelist's Autobiography: As I imagined, about as comprehensive as I imagine a "novelist's autobiography"--that is, not really at all. At first it seems like Roth wrote this for the obvious reasons, those being to address certain aspects of his fiction and compare them to real-life occurrences. That does happen a bit, but Roth doesn't seem to want to elaborate on any of it. Simply put, this isn't much of an autobiography, and Roth freely admits to being unable to stay away from embellishing certain themes even as he tacitly denies that, being as spiritually bankrupt as he is, they can actually mean anything. Still, though, there are anecdotes aplenty worth comparing Roth's fiction to, and independently a few stand out as being artfully presented. The framing device of having Roth send a manuscript of The Facts as well as a letter to his fictional alter ego, Nathan Zuckerman, is confusing, as is Zuckerman's long written response to Roth at the end of the book. It does serve to highlight the fact that there are severe differences between Zuckerman and Roth--for instance, Zuckerman's dad died before his mom, and Roth's dad didn't die mouthing the word "bastard." Still, what is to be meant of Zuckerman's criticism of the preceding manuscript? Does it even count as self-criticism? Is it meant to prove that this "autobiography" is nothing of the sort, and still belongs under fiction? I tend to think the latter. Roth's autobiography isn't really different from his fiction, and Zuckerman recognizes that, if that makes any sense.

Deception: A Novel: This is a very bizarre read, structured as it is almost entirely of dialogue, with no description, no modifiers, and very frequently no idea who is talking to who. It's kind of brilliant, and it proves that Roth can write dialogue that, while not what we would call "realistic," is certainly fascinating enough on its own. It's called Deception, of course, because it is about a series of (imagined?) affairs that Roth has, principally with a married British woman and a Czech runaway. As one can tell, most of these conversations happen post-coitus, and Roth is expert at capturing both the desperation and the flippancy of such conversations. It is never boring, exactly, and strikes me as a possibly very good play, except part of the pleasure of the book is not knowing who exactly is talking. If that doesn't sound pleasurable to you, you probably don't want to read it. If you want to read a book of people rambling on intelligently about sex, and I almost always do, then you don't do much better than this. By the way, this novel falls under the "Roth" aegis even though the principle character is referred to as "Philip" only once--this becomes a critical plot point later in yet another one of Roth's futile attempts to write himself into his stories as a means to escape persistent drama.

Patrimony: A True Story: Roth's second, more streamlined attempt at writing a memoir is quite a gesture, basically detailing the story of his father's final years and his battle with cancer. Roth's father, Herman, comes off as an extraordinarily likable figure, a far cry from Zuckerman's father, and what's more he seems to have a sense of humor about his son's work. There are several very funny sequences, which one appreciates more and more as Herman's cancer gets worse and Roth is unable to do anything other than write about it. I appreciate very much how candid Roth is in going through the precise medical details of someone dying of cancer (this is something he would get into in later works). When his father does die in the end, of course it makes for compelling reading, but at least part of the compulsion has to do with wondering how the hell someone can sit down and write about something like that. But he does, plainly, honestly, and admirably in my opinion. While this book is quite a downer, it is as fitting of an epitaph as one could imagine of an 86-year old former insurance agent who just happens to have sired a notorious novelist. How he managed to do this and not be sentimental is anyone's guess, but he far exceeded my expectations.

Operation Shylock: A Confession: I can't begin to imagine what inspired Roth to write a book like this, but I can only imagine he had a score to settle with someone, probably regarding the state of Israel. While previously his alter-ego Zuckerman had balked at the idea of talking about middle-eastern geopolitics, Roth delves into the issue headlong for the first time since The Counterlife, and crafts a very unsettling and compelling fictional memoir. At least part of this account we know to be true--Roth had a bad reaction to some sort of painkiller meant to help him after a knee operation, and he became depressed and suicidal for a brief time. After recovering, Roth finds that, bizarrely, someone has been impersonating him in Israel, going to public events claiming to be the real Philip Roth and preaching the creed of "diasporism," a sort of reverse Zionism wherein Jews would leave what was supposedly an unlawful occupation of Israel and come back to live in Europe and speak Yiddish. What makes matters more bizarre is that this fake Philip Roth looks and acts exactly like the real one. The real Roth was already planning on traveling to Israel to interview the author Aharon Applefeld, so he decides to do a bit of detective work while he's there. Suffice to say, however bizarre one thinks the situation already is, it gets far worse. Roth has never been more politically incisive: while he is obviously critical of a ludicrous ideology like diasporism, he is unsparing in his criticism of Israel, but not necessarily denying the necessity of a Jewish state. This is multifaceted, compelling pseudo-journalism at work here. Whether or not all or part of this book is some sort of elaborate fantasy is unclear, but this is definitely a book one can imagine Roth enjoying writing, if only for the fact that he'd relish making a few new enemies in the process.

The Plot Against America: A bit plot-heavy by Roth standards, but given the subject matter, it needed to be. The notion of alternate histories and "what if" scenarios had been a big part of science-fiction and especially comic books for quite some time. Roth's idea, to imagine such a scenario in the micro, in reference to his own boyhood, makes it far more charmingly personal and less ham-fisted. At least, until the end. Here's what happens (happened?): The famous aviator, anti-Semite and Hitler sympathizer Charles Lindbergh becomes the Republican presidential nominee in 1940, and later defeats FDR soundly on an isolationist platform. As a result, America never enters World War II, which spells dire consequences for England and the rest of the world. Meanwhile, young Philip Roth is 10 and a perfectly innocent young boy, alarmed by the fear that his parents seem to exhibit now that Lindbergh is president. Eventually, things do start to happen: Jewish families are "relocated," there are camps for Americanizing young Jewish boys, and anti-Semitic riots start breaking out. There's a lot of brilliant stuff going on here, even if it all seems a tad unlikely, given the circumstances. In fact, the big twist at the end (a rarity for Roth to even attempt such a thing) seems to come out of left field, even if it does make perfect sense in a blunt sort of way. However, Roth's feel for his hometown and his childhood, even in this alternate universe, is as keen and expressive as ever. But what is his message at the end? That for all America's wrongdoings, it will eventually correct itself in the end? It does seem a tad convenient at times.

Almost done. Coming up: Sabbath's Theater (my favorite!), Shop Talk and Everyman. Then I am done.

Philip Roth, Part IV

Sorry. In case you're wondering, I'm done, and have been for a while. I have already mentioned before how ridiculous it was to start with someone as prolific as Roth. In fact, he has a new book, Indignation, coming out in October. I'll read it when I get the chance and probably review it.

I'll do these all in quick succession. You might notice that pretty much all the books reviewed here border on straight up superlative--this was a man who had quite a winning streak later in life. It's been a pleasure, and immeasurably helpful in honing my honors thesis. I begin with the pseudo-continuation of the Zuckerman saga.

The Counterlife: Where this fits in the continuity spectrum of the Zuckerman novels is unclear; I get the impression that Roth never has really concerned himself with those issues, anyway. While the books that comprised Zuckerman Bound were essentially straightforward narratives with a fair amount of metatextual embellishment (such as the Anne Frank chapter in The Ghost Writer), The Counterlife is on a whole different level entirely. He experiments with the Zuckerman character using different fragments of narrative that often aren't elaborated upon or even referred to in the next chapter. A synopsis would be best served by addressing the individual chapters, but I don't think it's in your best interest for me to do so. Several aspects of Roth's work are worth talking about: for the first time, he takes on the gigantic subject of Israel, in a chapter where Zuckerman's brother leaves his family to join a fanatical Zionist kibbutz. The conversations that Nathan and his brother, Henry, have regarding the necessity and the foolhardiness of establishing the state of Israel strike me as being a far better attempt at political commentary than Our Gang. Some of the later chapters, which deal with anti-Semitism in Zuckerman's adopted England, seem less powerful, if only because I was shocked to find Roth aiming his vitriol at Christians, of all people. Not that they don't need it, but what sort of middle-ground is he suggesting, between fanatical Zionist bloodletting and a English passive-aggressive anti-Semitism? Zuckermanism, or something else none of us can subscribe to.

American Pastoral: And then, of course, is this beauty of a novel, which I have actually read before. It's often referred to as the "second" Zuckerman trilogy (The Prague Orgy counts as an appendix to the first one, and The Counterlife has no choice but to stand alone). What differs this trilogy from the previous one is that, while Zuckerman is once again the author, he takes a secondary role, instead choosing to highlight (and subsequently fictionalize) minor figures in his life and devise a way in which to make these lives reflect the tapestry of American social upheaval. American Pastoral is about "Swede" Levov, a Jewish Adonis and former sports hero who is the most fundamentally decent character I think Roth has ever created. He takes over his father's glove factory (leading to some brilliant exposition from Roth about the science of glove-making--you probably don't believe me but it is mind-blowing stuff), marries a former Miss New Jersey, and has a daughter. As good a husband and father as he is, he can't prevent his daughter from becoming increasingly radicalized by the situation in Vietnam, and she starts hanging out with unsavory, Weather Underground type characters. Eventually, she bombs a post office and kills someone, and subsequently vanishes. Seeing "Swede" Levov try to reconcile these feelings of paternal love with the knowledge that her daughter murdered someone is affecting, as is their final confrontation. I should add that their daughter, Merry, struck me as such a loathsome toolbag that it almost justifies the Vietnam war.

I Married A Communist: Once again, Zuckerman writes about a childhood figure, although ostensibly this time his recount of the life of the actor Ira Ringgold is less fictionalized than it is stratified through the minds of both Zuckerman and Ira's brother, who recounts about half of what goes on. This is often considered the weak link in the trilogy, and I agree with that assessment: Unlike Swede Levov and Coleman Silk, Ira Ringgold seems more of a victim not of the times but of his own pathetic attempts to stay attached to his communist ideology. Not that a great book couldn't be made out of this, and admittedly, it is filled with great stuff. While painted in broad strokes, Roth's depiction of the communist witch hunters is certainly entertaining and well thought out, although Roth has the habit of making all the enemies of communism by extension closet fascist sympathizers, with the exception of Ira's brother. Ira as a character still seems somewhat of a mystery, and his relationship with the young Zuckerman seems to be a tad on the convenient side: considering all that Zuckerman has been through, the fact that he never mentions this person before makes us wonder if Zuckerman isn't writing fiction again. As I stated before, I don't think that's something Roth is ever very concerned with.

The Human Stain: Almost unbearably emotionally resonant, in the manner of My Life as a Man and The Anatomy Lesson, this book packs quite a punch, even if Roth spends much of it attacking the shallowness and intellectual dishonesty of my age group (the "dumbest generation," Coleman Silk says at one point). Unlike the first two parts of the trilogy, this is set in the recent past, during the Clinton Whitewater hearings, and Roth makes much of how ridiculous it was that America was concerned with the sexual habits of the president. Against this backdrop, Roth tells the story of Coleman Silk, a neighbor of Zuckerman's and a professor at a small liberal arts college who gets kicked out for a supposed racial slur (he calls two students-- who happen to be black--spooks, referring to their continual absence from his classroom, not their race). The subsequent stress and disappointment ends up taking its toll on Silk's wife, so he implores Zuckerman to write his story. At first, Zuckerman refuses, but they become friends nonetheless. Silk, who is 71, starts having a torrid love affair with a 33-year old janitor whose life has been so tragic it verges on being a Chekhovian cartoon. All of this stuff is excellently told, and Roth easily manages to pull of the feat of having Zuckerman get in the minds of these different characters who don't even know who he is. While far from an impartial observer, Zuckerman manages to stay out of the fray until he is needed in the final sequence, which is quite a good one. This was made into a movie with Anthony Hopkins and Nicole Kidman, if you remember. This would seem at first like the least filmable of the trilogy, but I guess others disagree.

Exit Ghost: Roth's most recent book, and reportedly the last one to involve Nathan Zuckerman. This is probably a good thing, because after three straight books where he tried telling other people's stories, he has become self-involved to the point where he strikes me as being a bitter old phoney (sp?). Zuckerman, now in his 70s, is completely incontinent and impotent from prostate surgery, but is told that a possible cure is awaiting him in New York City. So, the reclusive Zuckerman travels to New York for the first time in several decades, and immediately starts kvetching about all the cell phones and iPods he sees. If anything, Exit Ghost is meant to mirror many of the themes and strands of the first Zuckerman book, The Ghost Writer. E.I. Lonoff is long dead, and a young hotshot writer tries to interview Zuckerman about his relationship with the writer, to be part of some sort of revelatory biography. In response, Zuckerman treats the young man like shit, vowing to go so far as to ruin his literary aspirations if he publishes this biography. Meanwhile, he starts having sexual feelings for a woman whose apartment he plans to rent for a year, feelings of course he cannot act upon due to his impotence. Meanwhile, he complains about how hard and humiliating it is to have to wear diapers, and the surgery doesn't do much to help him. This is a sad and very slight book, a bizarre end note to be sure. Zuckerman, towards the end of his life, no longer seems to be an interesting or enlightening character, but rather an old and disgruntled man furious about his impending death. It doesn't make for the most compelling reading.

Next: all of the Roth books, including The Facts: A Novelist's Autobiography, Deception: A Novel, Patrimony: A True Story, Operation Shylock: A Confession, and The Plot Against America (Why did Roth become so enamored with colons all of a sudden? Why have I?).