The Dying Animal
The last of Philip Roth’s “Kepesh” novels is the best of the three. A 150 page unloading of septuagenarian fears, regrets and revelation presented as one unending confession to an undisclosed friend. Prof. Kepesh seems content diddling his students, appearing on PBS and NPR and hanging out at Lincoln Center until he gets in the drawers of the Cuban-American Goddess Consuela, wherein he falls completely to shreds.
I never know just how much we are supposed to laugh/scoff at Roth’s characters for being such a-holes. There are garages full of essays wondering just how much of Roth’s work is autobiographical, but considering he has been married and divorced a few times, and since this is a persistent theme in his work, I am starting to believe that Roth really does place the weight of the entire world on his schlong. In which case, maybe he isn’t as clear-eyed an observer of life, the universe and everything as much as I suspected.
Still, this book is very entertaining, loaded with laughs as well as some depressing-as-hell passages (it is called The Dying Animal after all.) Recommended highly.