Rent My Life As a Man

Synopsis

Philip Roth’s fiction has often come very close to fact, and in MY LIFE AS A MAN (1974), his sixth novel (and first post-PORTNOY), he gives us Peter Tarnopol, a rising young writer whose many resemblances to Roth are blatant and whose story recalls Roth’s first brief disastrous marriage to a woman who, soon after their divorce, was killed in a car crash. In the novel, Tarnopol is involved in a chillingly cruel and destructive marriage with a woman named Maureen. Even after her death, their relationship obsesses and depresses him, and he is driven to consulting a psychiatrist, Dr. Spielvogel (who was also Portnoy’s doctor). MY LIFE AS A MAN includes two autobiographical short stories, ostensibly by Tarnopol, before the novel itself begins--one about his childhood, one about a destructive woman in his life who, in the succeeding novel, morphs into the evil Maureen. This novel has contributed hugely to the popular perception of Roth as a misogynist. It is also, like most of Roth’s fiction, hilarious, often true, and definitely a page-turner.

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