Roth

Philip Roth

Author of 'Portnoy's Complaint' celebrates his birthday

March 19, 1998
Web posted at: 3:18 p.m. EDT (1518 GMT)

(CNN) -- Philip Roth has a gift for writing gritty, ironic, stories depicting middle-class Jewish life. Thursday the author is 65.

His first work, "Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories", published in 1959, won the National Book Award for fiction. Since then, his themes have been broad, from the sober "My Life as a Man" to the emotionally winding "Sabbath's Theater."

His third novel, "Portnoy's Complaint", established his frenetic style. This "comic masterpiece" describes the sexual frustration of Alexander Portnoy, driven by fear of his mother to fulfilling his sexual desires in unorthodox ways.

Roth was born in Newark, New Jersey, in 1933. He attended Rutgers University and received his B.A. at Bucknell. After getting his M.A. from the University of Chicago, he taught English there as well.

He lives in Connecticut.

Selected Works:

"Goodbye, Columbus" 1959 "The Great American Novel" 1973 "Zuckerman Unbound" 1981 "Zuckerman Bound" 1985 "The Counterlife" 1987 "Operation Shylock" 1993 "Sabbath's Theater" 1995

Synopsis for Sabbath's Theater:

Mickey Sabbath is an outrageous rascal, a retired puppeteer obsessed with sex and death. His first wife disappeared, and he says he murdered her, even though his friends know it isn't so. His mistress has left him, and he has lost his grip on reality.

For 30 years, he has been teaching in rural New England. Now he embarks on a reckless journey back into his past in search of redemption and lost youth that takes him through Manhattan to the New Jersey shore. But no matter how ardently he courts death, he is too alive to succeed at dying.

Courtesy of McNaughton Books

Related sites:

Note: Pages will open in a new browser window

• Jewish Bulletin Online
• Purdue: Philip Roth

External sites are not endorsed by CNN Interactive.

---

 

---

Sound off on our message boards & chat

© 1998 Cable News Network, Inc.
All Rights Reserved.

Terms under which this service is provided to you.