The Grapes of Roth: "Diasporism" Between Portnoy and Shy lock

Sidra Dekoven Ezrahi*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

Abstract

This chapter discusses Philip Roth's addition to the growing chorus of "diasporists" in the academy and the arts. In his novel Operation Shylock: A Confession, Roth made a cultural statement that not only finds value in recuperating discarded or defunct models, like crinolines crumbling in an old attic trunk, it is part of a postmodern search for value in the interstices, in the outskirts and peripheries of sacred centers and in the imagination of alternative worlds. The book is a narrative fiction whose conventional mandate and popular appeal lie in its potential for entertainment or edification, its main achievement lies in enacting some of the more ludicrous or lurid dimensions of a larger cultural agenda.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationStudies in Contemporary Jewry
Subtitle of host publicationXII: Literary Strategies: Jewish Texts and Contexts
PublisherOxford University Press
ISBN (Electronic)9780199854608
ISBN (Print)0195112032, 9780195112030
DOIs
StatePublished - 3 Oct 2011

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 1996 by Oxford University Press, Inc. All rights reserved.

Keywords

  • Cultural agenda
  • Diasporists
  • Entertainment
  • Fiction
  • Narrative
  • Operation Shylock
  • Philip Roth

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