Philip Roth

Everyman

Alawander Bouston 

longing for the best of boyhood, for the tubular sprout that was then his body and that rode the waves from way out where they began to build, rode them with his arms pointed like an arrowhead and the skinny rest of him following behind like the arrow's shaft, rode them all the way in to where his rib cage scraped against the tiny sharp pebbles and jagged clamshells and pulverised seashells at the edge of the shore and he hustled to his feet and hurriedly turned and went lurching through the low surf until it was knee high and deep enough for him to plunge in and begin swimming madly out to the rising breakers—into the advancing, green Atlantic, rolling unstoppably toward him like the  obstinate fact of the future and, if he was lucky, make it there in time to catch the next big wave and then the next and the next…

It was true to its title, sadly. The prose was fine. The conceit of every character having a name except the protagonist was clever, but even that (given when it was written) had been done before, and done better (

). Everyman deserves sympathy only because we all deserve sympathy, but from a realistic point of view his son’s opinion of him was not far from my own assessment, in the end.

Matthew Wright

Huh, so that’s Philip Roth.

It was true to its title, sadly. The prose was fine. The conceit of every character having a name except the protagonist was clever, but even that (given when it was written) had been done before, and done better (Written on the Body comes to mind, and The Lover). Everyman deserves sympathy only because we all deserve sympathy, but from a realistic point of view his son’s opinion of him was not far from my own assessment, in the end.

A simple but powerful reminder to cherish the life we have, to hold our loved ones close, to consider the pain and remorse carried by every individual, and to utilize the time we have left to attempt to account for our earlier wrongs.

Brandon

Woah! Finished in a day. Will be reading more of Philip Roth 🤩

Molly Bridge

Sanaa Shaltout

رحلة إنسان عاش لمجرد الحياة فقط فكر بنفسه فقط ونتيجة أنانيته بقى وحيداً

Chiara Malaspina di Orezzoli

Come sempre Roth ti toglie tutte le speranze: nel mondo, nelle persone, in te stessa.
Quando finisco un suo romanzo rimango seduta in poltrona a guardare il vuoto come una cretina, ma evidentemente è una sensazione che crea dipendenza. E' uno di quegli autori che mi costringono a non leggere niente per i seguenti 3/4 giorni perché tutto il resto sarebbe una sicura delusione.

Trevor Berrett

After reading The Gathering and Disgrace, I thought I'd be tired of reading about death and the decline of the body. However, while The Gathering was simply depressing for the sake of being depressing (and not that well written anyway), Disgrace and now Everyman treat the subject with depth that looks beyond the initial depression and into what I consider to be the deeper implications, all of the conflicting emotions, of growing old and watching your body and others' bodies decline. I did not think this book was depressing, though it begins with the funeral of the protagonist. On the contrary, it seems to show even more how meaningful life is. Perhaps this was based more on my perspective since I don't think Roth's primary objective was to make people go live life to the fullest. I think he just candidly presents a difficult subject without shirking the many emotions and practicalities.

Carolina Lopes

1,5* - I hadn't been this bored in a while

Marek R

Martha F.

Lindsy Rice

A kabel 

Dane Jensen

gaia costa 

Chuck D'Antonio

Neta Steingart

Michael Reali

Melody Izard

Cem Pekdogru

Joshua Line

KMed

Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction Everyman is a candidly intimate yet universal story of loss, regret and stoicism. The novel takes its title from a classic of early English drama, whose theme is the summoning of the living to death. The fate of Roth's everyman is traced from his first shocking confrontation with death on the idyllic beaches of his childhood summers, through the family trials and professional achievements of his vigorous adulthood, and into his old age when he is stalked with physical woes. The terrain of this powerful novel is the human body. Its subject is the common experience that terrifies us all.

Everyman

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