American Pastoral Audiobook By Philip Roth cover art

American Pastoral

American Trilogy, Book 1

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American Pastoral

By: Philip Roth
Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
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Here is Philip Roth’s masterpiece, featuring Nathan Zuckerman and the story of Swede Levov, a legendary athlete at his Newark high school, who grows up in the booming postwar years to marry a former Miss New Jersey, inherit his father’s glove factory, and move into a stone house in the idyllic hamlet of Old Rimrock. And then one day in 1968, Swede’s beautiful American luck deserts him.

For Swede’s adored daughter, Merry, has grown from a loving, quick-witted girl into a sullen, fanatical teenager—a teenager capable of an outlandishly savage act of domestic terrorism. And overnight Swede is wrenched out of the longed-for American pastoral and into the indigenous American berserk. Compulsively listenable, propelled by sorrow, rage, and a deep compassion for its characters, American Pastoral gives us Philip Roth at the height of his powers.

©1997 Philip Roth (P)2023 Blackstone Publishing Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Jewish Jewish Heritage Literary Fiction World Literature
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Simply amazing! Felt like a radio-play - so well presented by the narrater Malcolm Hillgartner!

The epic story by Philip Roth.

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I don’t know why the storm is this in such a roundabout almost tedious way

Let me was good. The story itself isn’t bad I guess. But…

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Somewhere in this book is an interesting story, but it is buried by layers and layers of repetitive details on glove making.

Do you like gloves?

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Raw History was it was made. Scary reliving of those days. I lived through them again.

Roth’s writing

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It started out weak, but then next thing you know, you’ve been caught in the world that is Swede Luvov

Meandering turns into a gripping tale

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I felt I was drowning in the emotional state of another. Just simply too much to abide.

Too much

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The incredible tragedy of a good man, who was his whole life striving to be a good man, to build a good life for his family, only to have his daughter grow up to be a terrorist. His desparate efforts to figure out where and how he went wrong are soul wrenching.

profound and terrifying

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This would be difficult for me to read, but listening to it, I was able to rewind and listen again to passages and better understand this “story within a story.” I love the descriptions of Newark NJ, the intertwined relationships of Jews, Catholics and WASPs and commentary on American society. Lou Levov is such a great character.

Masterful writing

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No one can describe darkness of all of the human emotions like Roth. The Swede is forever etched in my mind.

Darkness

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glad I listened to this one. I went on a journey into these characters and this time

the story of a particular time. deep character study. dark underbelly of mid-century american dream

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