The Humbling

Starred review from August 10, 2009
A deteriorating and increasingly irrelevant actor finds the possibility of renewal in a younger woman in Roth's tight Chekhovian tragedy. At 65, Simon Axler, a formerly celebrated stage actor, is undergoing a crisis: he can no longer act, his wife leaves him and, suicidal, he checks himself into a psych ward. Then he retires to his upstate New York farm to wait for... something, which arrives in the form of Pegeen, daughter of some old theater friends who is now a “lithe, full-breasted woman of forty, though with something of a child still in her smile.” A Rothian affair ensues, despite (or perhaps because of) their age difference and Pegeen's lesbian past. Axler overlooks all the signs that should warn him not to trust too much in the affair and instead tries out more and more sexual turns with Pegeen (spanking, strap-ons, role play), until one night they pick up a drunk local for a three-way that might prove to be soul-crushing. Roth observes much (about age, success and the sexual credit lovers hold one with another) in little space, and the svelte narrative amounts to an unsparing confrontation of self.

Starred review from October 15, 2009
Another concise, bruising examination of sexual obsession in early old age from Roth (Indignation, 2008, etc.).

A series of disastrous stage performances have persuaded much admired 65-year-old actor Simon Axler that—not unlike, not at all unlike Shakespeare's Prospero—he has"lost his magic." The complex dnouement that follows this crisis of recognition shows us multiple facets of Simon's"humbling." His bitter insistence that his talent has fled him is challenged in a superbly animated conversation with his longtime agent, a stubborn spirit urging Simon to fight to reclaim what's his. During an illuminating stay at a psychiatric hospital, Simon measures his own pain and loss against the sufferings of a frail fellow patient betrayed by her monstrously selfish husband. In the novel's centerpiece section, Simon has a serpentine though rejuvenating affair with 40-year-old Pegeen Mike, a"reformed" lesbian attracted by the stability and the financial resources of this seductive, obviously smitten older man. Their dramatic folieà deux plays out the only way it can, fulfilling the subtle promises of its early scenes. Roth connects the dots precisely and ruthlessly, allowing Simon to realize that"he could no more figure out how to play the elderly lover abandoned by the mistress twenty-five years his junior than he'd been able to figure out how to play Macbeth."

Allusive, elusive and peppered with mordant wit to a downright Strindbergian degree—one of Roth's most eloquent, painful and memorable books.

(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

September 1, 2009
Simon Axler wowed theater critics with his outsize talent and persona for 40 years, taming major roles from Shakespeare to Chekov to Miller, but one evening at the Kennedy Center, he suffers a meltdown so terrifying and complete that he consigns himself to an institution for a month of group, art, and physical therapies. The blockage cannot be explained away through normal psychiatric channels, so Axler retreats to his country estate, where he fantasizes about the shotgun in the attic, unable to summon the courage to play the role of a man committing suicide. An unexpected visit from Pegeen Stapleford, the daughter of old friends and 25 years his junior, sets the stage for a recurring Roth theme ("The Dying Animal, Exit Ghost"), the pathos of the aging artist seeking revitalization through an all-encompassing sexual liaison. VERDICT Roth, the incomparable recipient of every major literary award, has written a sorrowful novella. Those of us who believe that he is one of the greatest living American writers will continue to do so, but if 60 is the new 40, readers may tire of his bleak insistence that artistic productivity ends so early. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ" 7/09.]Sally Bissell, Lee Cty. Lib. Syst., Ft. Myers, FL

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from November 15, 2009
The great Roth has always written both short novels and long novels, choosing a length perfectly suited to what he has to say. Thus, his thirtieth book is brief and perfectly so. Soon into its pages, the reader will recall the title of a famous play about Henry II of England, The Lion in Winter. The lion here, increasingly toothless, is sixtysomething Simon Axler, a famous stage and screen actor. Yes, hes famous, but now he is so stultified by uncertainty about his talent and how to execute his craft that he can no long perform. His wife flees, and Simon retires to his upstate New York farm, even checking himself into a psychiatric ward for a short stay. Roth does not labor over the mans distress. Using spare prose, he makes the situation only as poignant as it deserves to be. When Simon takes up with a woman young enough to be his daughter, who is the daughter of old acting friends, Roth again uses concise language to best convey the sadness of what is only a short rehabilitation for Simon, and which ultimately forces his hand in determining how his life will proceedor not. Roths voice, long heard and long appreciated, remains profound.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)