Creative Burrow

BunnyWarren => LibraryBurrow => Topic started by: elbitjusticiero on 07:08pm Tue, Aug 11, 2015

Title: [Book] Philip Roth's *The human stain*
Post by: elbitjusticiero on 07:08pm Tue, Aug 11, 2015
I've just finished reading The human stain, a famous novel by Philip Roth. I grabbed it after finishing Kundera's the unbearable lightness of being, which is interesting because Kundera's philosophy and quality is referenced in a passage of Roth's book.

I can't even begin to say how good this book is. I had never read anything by Roth before, and I wish I had, because he wrote many books and if this is any indication, he might become one of my favorite authors.

The story follows the fall from grace of Coleman Silk, a venerable college profesor and ex dean who's been falsely accused of racism. At 71, he's also taken a young lover, a 34-year-old cleaning woman named Faunia Farley. Their affair becomes known two years after his quitting the university, after his wife has died maybe because of the suffering from that incident, and now Silk is symbolically sacrificed again. His friend, writer Nathan Zuckerman (the protagonist of several previous novels by Roth), is witness to all of this and his voice is prevalent in the pages of the novel, as he offers us the kind of deep, smart observations that we expect from an acute intellectual.

But that is nothing! Nothing, I tell you! Because about a quarter way of this 360-page book we find out that Coleman Silk has another secret. I will reveal it under spoiler tags, but believe me, it's best not to know it, and I strongly suggest you to grab the novel and read it, and the effect will be greatly diminished if you know this secret beforehand.

Coleman Silk is black. As in, a black man, a colored man, only with white skin. Some people notice that he's a Negro or a nigger, words that are directed to him in the story, but most people don't have a clue, and that's how he can become a respected member of the academic community in the years of racial prejudice before the human rights advancements. His decision to pass for white estranged him from his family and let him rebuild himself as a different person.

It's all very puzzling and at times hilarious, and it lets Roth perform a literary tour de force, painting a masterful portrait of past and current America. Also, the title drop, by means of Faunia, reminded me of Albert Camus' The plague, but I found it immensely interesting that the observation this woman (this illiterate woman, this disadvantaged and suicidal cleaning lady) makes in that passage is, in The plague, uttered by the one character in the book Camus treats as a philosopher. Talk about differences in the French and American approach to literature!

In short, I profusely recommend this novel, and I truly hope you have resisted the temptation to read the spoiler. It's more than worth it.
Title: Re: [Book] Philip Roth's *The human stain*
Post by: Bunny on 11:59pm Tue, Aug 11, 2015
It was hard resisting the spoiler, but I did it!

Know anywhere I can get the audiobook? :D
Title: Re: [Book] Philip Roth's *The human stain*
Post by: elbitjusticiero on 12:17am Wed, Aug 12, 2015
Sadly, not. I read it on paper. It was given to me by someone who was getting rid of many books and let me grab some before going to the donation bin. :)