The Ghost Writer introduces Nathan Zuckerman in the 1950s, a budding writer infatuated with the Great Books, discovering the contradictory claims of literature and experience while an overnight guest in the secluded New England farmhouse of his idol, E. I. Lonoff. At Lonoff's, Zuckerman meets Amy Bellette, a haunting young woman of indeterminate foreign background who turns out to be a former student of Lonoff's and who may also have been his mistress. Zuckerman, with his active, youthful imagination, wonders if she could be the paradigmatic victim of Nazi persecution. If she were, it might change his life. The first volume of the trilogy and epilogue Zuckerman Bound, The Ghost Writer is about the tensions between literature and life, artistic truthfulness and conventional decency--and about those implacable practitioners who live with the consequences of sacrificing one for the other.
A middle-aged writer recalls his younger self. At 23, Nathan Zuckerman has had four stories published and a small, flattering Saturday Review up-and-coming-author profile (complete with a photo of him playing with his ex-girlfriend's cat), which he purports to scorn. As genuine and polite as he seems, Zuckerman has already hurt his family with his autobiographical art and ruined his relationship with adultery and honesty. Visiting his reclusive idol (famed for his "blend of sympathy and pitilessness") in the Berkshires, the writer watches himself watching himself and attempts to confront his work and life. Instead he finds himself turning reality into metafiction. A quote he happens upon from Henry James only complicates matters further: "We work in the dark--we do what we can--we give what we have. Our doubt is our passion and our passion is our task. The rest is the madness of art." Events, however, have their revenge, weaving more out of control than even he can anticipate or ask for. Philip Roth is the master of the uncomfortable, and his alter ego a connoisseur of self-involvement, self-loathing, and self-examination. ("Virtuous reader, if you think that after intercourse all animals are sad, try masturbating on the daybed in E. I. Lonoff's study and see how you feel when it's over.")
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.5 / 5.0
Fun house at the water park:
Put on your bathing suit and expect to get sprayed at every turn. When you think he's serious, he's kitschy. When he's just gone too far, he gets serious, philosophical. Always self-referential. But if you think it's autobiographical, he's just having fun with you. And you with him. At the same time, this is not daytime TV. The quality of imagery and writing is so much better, dark jewels jumping out every few pages. Just one I remember: a character rushes through a conversation, summarizing the Jews who... more info
Delightful Discovery for Me...:
As a writer you must read this book...As a reader you must write a review...as someone who loves a good tale... I urge you to read this book...As history takes many prisoners in its unrelentless march toward victory...we must define the terms of what that victory is...read this book...
Well Made and Engaging:
In THE GHOST WRITER, Philip Roth intertwines two subjects--literary greatness and 20th century Jewish experience. In doing so, he creates four amazing characters. These are: E.I. Lonoff, a great and reclusive writer; Nathan Zuckerman, a promising young writer; Hope, Lonoff's volatile wife; and Amy Bellette, a protégé of Lonoff who is organizing the great man's papers. As writers, Lonoff and Nathan are very different. Lonoff, Nathan's literary father, writes about isolated Jews. In... more info
Exploring creative writing as art, religion, drudgery, and sacrifice:
I recently read "Exit Ghost," the last book in the Zuckerman series, and vowed I would read the first book in the series, "Ghost Writer," because I wanted to uncover whatever parallels I might find that would further my enjoyment and understanding. Let me say from the beginning that I thoroughly enjoyed both books. There is hardly a page of Roth's writing that doesn't amuse, fascinate, enthrall, or generally cause my brain to flare up with pure intellectual delight. Roth is surely a national literary... more info
