Posted on 10/04/2002 5:40:12 PM PDT by dighton
Philip Roth, one of America’s most distinguished living novelists, has attacked as “repugnant” the “orgy of national narcissism” that has gripped the United States since September 11.
His comments risk the fierce opprobrium that has greeted other American intellectuals - among them Norman Mailer, Gore Vidal and Susan Sontag - who have dared to question the patriotism that still dominates America’s public rhetoric.
But with his reputation in recent years cemented by a sequence of intensely political novels - including The Human Stain, I Married A Communist and American Pastoral - his is a powerful voice of dissent.
“What we are witnessing since September 11 is an orgy of national narcissism and a gratuitous victim mentality which is repugnant,” he said in an interview with the French newspaper Le Figaro.
“And that’s not the end of it. Even now, it’s impossible to see a baseball match which isn’t preceded by singing God Bless America and invocations to the memory of ‘our heroes’. You want to say: stop. That’s enough.”
He said: “Other towns have suffered worse catastrophes, and the Americans themselves have inflicted them in their history, even if it was for good reasons - I am not a pacifist. You have to keep a sense of proportion.”
To the much-repeated suggestion that America “lost her innocence” after September 11, Mr Roth said: “What innocence? From 1668 to 1865 this country had slavery; and from 1865 to 1955 was a society existing under a brutal segregation. I don’t really know what these people are talking about.”
Roth was in New York on September 11 last year. He had arrived in town the previous day, he said, intending to stay a few days to “recharge his batteries” after the completion of his last novel, The Dying Animal.
On the morning of September 11, he went to a sports club for a swim, where he learned what had happened.
“I went ahead and had a swim anyway,” he said. “Evidently I had absorbed the shock like everyone, without really realising it.
“I finally stayed several months in New York, where I kept a studio. For me New York had become interesting again because it was a town in crisis, particularly in the weeks that followed when everyone was expecting another attack. It was a strange time and the first time for years that New York interested me.”
Roth said President George W Bush’s pronouncements on the attacks had “revolted” him, and that it was up to writers to go against the untruths of public language.
He said: “Language is always a lie; above all, public language. McCarthy used a certain language to hunt communists. That which was used against Clinton is a bit more sophisticated. As for Bush, it’s ventriloquists who make him speak.”
© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2002.
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Intellectuals? ....Intellectuals? ...How about pretentious decadent assholes.
Prov.24 [7] Wisdom is too high for a fool: he openeth not his mouth in the gate.
But there are others:
Prov.19 [1] Better is the poor that walketh in his integrity, than he that is perverse in his lips, and is a fool.
Prov.23 [9] Speak not in the ears of a fool: for he will despise the wisdom of thy words.
Prov.21 [20] There is treasure to be desired and oil in the dwelling of the wise; but a foolish man spendeth it up.
Prov.22 [15] Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child; but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him.
Prov.19 [3] The foolishness of man perverteth his way: and his heart fretteth against the LORD.
[10] Delight is not seemly for a fool; much less for a servant to have rule over princes.
[13] A foolish son is the calamity of his father: and the contentions of a wife are a continual dropping.
[29] Judgments are prepared for scorners, and stripes for the back of fools.
Prov.26 [3] A whip for the horse, a bridle for the ass, and a rod for the fool's back.
Narcissists could never remain calm while their opponents railed, focused and determined in Afghanistan while saving starving Afghan children and putting our troops and country first, or remain married to a woman like Laura Bush. Phillip Roth is clueless about our President, and life.
"My husband and I find strength in the word of the Lord, and we realize the power that prayer has in our own lives." "I'm truly blessed to be married to a man who's strong enough to bear the burdens and humble enough to ask God for help." - First Lady Laura Bush
Link (not a narcissist).
My my. From the mouths of babes and nitwits. Perfect example of why we don't like liberals.
There's an obvious joke about Portnoy's habit and its consequences.
Phillip Roth is front and center in support for "gratuitous victim mentality" in all of his novels. I wouldn't be suprised to hear him supporting the "reparations" movement either. As for "God Bless America", well Mr. Roth doesn't care much for God anyway.
Is this really what passes for intellect in America? Isn't that pathetic?
And the Brits fall for it, too. Oh well, I watched Clinton's speech to the Brit Labor Party. He averaged approximately one falsehood per sentence, not a personal best, but journeymanlike, delivered in perfect pitch to appeal to the Brits' own conceit, and they soaked it up with universal gazes of admiration.
Of course, they're socialists, you expect them to be easily impressed. With a few brightly colored trinkets he could have bought London from them, I suspect.
Would Roth be referring, perchance, to "I never had sexual relations with that woman...Miss Lewinski."?
regards
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