The judaism in Philip Roth: a concept in reverse / O judaismo em Philip Roth: um conceito às avessas
AUTOR(ES)
Dora Landa
DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO
2010
RESUMO
This paper aims to analyse some of Philip Roths work, in which the Jewish subject is the main axis. My greater interest lies basically upon the romances in which the Jewish Holocaust, during the Second World War and the State of Israel with its complex situation in Middle East are aproached. I have based my analysis of his works on the following hipothesis: in order to get closer to recent traumatic situations of the Jewish history, Philip Roth had to use narrative resources that allow him to enlarge his point of view, avoiding stereotypes and fruitless generalizations. Therefore, the Rothian style, highly ironic and humorous, has been altered. In The Counterlife the point of departure is an absurd situation: an American Jewish dead character resurges alive at a Jewish settlement on Cisjordanie, and fighting for the Great Israel. Such resourse enabled a unusual aproach of the tense Arab-Israeli relationship. In Operation Shylock we find an impertinent and exasperating double, that heralds an absurd solution for the Middle East conflict. Eventually, in The Plot Against America, the author adopts distopy as a resource, having the U.S. elect a Nazi president, in 1940, with all the appaling consequences for the Jewish community. Interviews with the author, as well as books in which he extensively analyses his own and other authors literary production, specially Primo Levi and Aharon Appelfeld, also acted as valuable sources for the analysis of the ever polemic positioning of the author towards his Jewish condition.
ASSUNTO(S)
state of israel narrative resourses temática judaica estado de israel jewish holocaust holocausto judeu jewish subject situações traumáticas recursos narrativos traumatic situations
