By Rachel Davidson
Claudia Roth-Pierpont
Image from: The New Yorker
Recently, The George Washington University
program in Judaic Studies and the Department of English welcomed Roth Unbound author Claudia
Roth-Pierpont as the fourth speaker for Professor Faye Moskowitz’ class, Jewish
Lit Live. In an afternoon discussion for the JLL class and an evening reading
open to the public, Roth-Pierpont (the name Roth
is pure coincidence) discussed her new book, as well as two of Roth’s early
works, Goodbye, Columbus and Portnoy’s Complaint. While Roth-Pierpont
spent hundreds of hours in conversation with Roth, Roth ultimately had no say
in the content of Roth Unbound and
was not allowed to read it until its final publication. Hearing Roth-Pierpont elaborate on the ways
in which Philip Roth has been misunderstood by the Jewish and feminist
communities was a valuable experience for anyone with interests in America’s
dynamic social culture or the intentions of an author.
Philip Roth’s writing is still relevant because
of his unique voice, but Roth-Pierpont emphasized that Roth’s authorial voice
should not be mistaken as his opinion.
She challenged us to forget what Roth the author is saying, and focus
instead on what his characters are saying.
Roth-Pierpont described Roth’s capacity to build stories situated in the
unique struggles of their times and how these complicated themes were often
misinterpreted. After the release of Portnoy’s Complaint, Roth was branded as
a misogynist by many feminist critics and as an anti-Semite by many Jews. As a self-identifying feminist herself,
Roth-Pierpont found these accusations laughable and noted that Roth’s male
characters are just as, if not more so, troubled than his female
characters. Roth did not invent the
over-bearing, Jewish Mother trope, yet many Jews felt that it was dangerous to
reveal the less than pleasant realities of Jewish families post World-War Two.
In a story like “Eli The Fanatic”, Roth presents a situation in which
assimilated Jews are more threatened by an orthodox Yeshivah than the gentile
population, nodding to the latent insecurities concerning modernity present
within the Jewish community. These
insecurities were reflected back onto Roth, and the misogynist and anti-Semite
labels stuck.
One label that Roth would not deny
would be that of “Nixon-Hater”. In his 1971 political satire, Our Gang, Roth follows the story of
Trick E. Dixon, a character who eventually runs his campaign in Hell. When
Richard Nixon got word of this novel, he said, “’A lot of this can be turned to our advantage. ... I think
the anti-Semitic thing can be, I hate to say it, but it can be very helpful to
us’ to which his chief of staff adds, ‘There are a lot more anti-Semites than
there are Jews, and the anti-Semites are with us generally and the Jews aren’t.’”
As this incredible exchange shows, Roth had established himself enough as a
writer to be brought up in a conversation in the oval office as a threatening
figure. Roth-Pierpont cited this as a moment where truth was stranger than
fiction, but also a moment that further complicates Roth’s status as a Jewish
writer.
Roth-Pierpont suggested that anyone
who takes the time to actually read Roth’s work would find a wide breadth of
male and female, and Jewish and non-Jewish characters that make it impossible
to make any overreaching argument about Roth’s personal opinions. She suggests
that many early readers completely missed the tenderness of a character like
Alex Portnoy because they were so fixated on his occasionally overwhelming
sexuality. She revealed that Portnoy’s
Complaint is the only book Roth occasionally regrets writing, but only
because a topic as frivolous as masturbation overshadowed much of his later
work. While some early readers treated Portnoy’s Complaint how modern readers
treat 50 Shades of Gray,
Roth-Pierpont suggests that the book is really about fighting to break free
from what society says you should be.
At the age of 81, Roth has officially retired
from his career as an author. When Roth-Pierpont was asked, “why now?” she
explained that after a lifetime of writing character’s lives, Roth wanted to
live his own life. Describing Roth as an
ultimately optimistic and life-affirming man, it seems fitting that days spent
writing in isolation would not be the ideal way to spend time. These insights into Roth’s life made for a
though-provoking afternoon and evening, and definitely sparked my own interest
in Roth’s extensive works.
