The Human Stain: A Novel (Paperback)

by Philip Roth (Author) "IT WAS in the summer of 1998 that my neighbor Coleman Silk-who, before retiring two years earlier, had been a classics professor at nearby Athena..." (more)
Key Phrases: human stain, Coleman Silk, East Orange, New York (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Athena College was snoozing complacently in the Berkshires until Coleman Silk--formerly "Silky Silk," undefeated welterweight pro boxer--strode in and shook the place awake. This faculty dean sacked the deadwood, made lots of hot new hires, including Yale-spawned literary-theory wunderkind Delphine Roux, and pissed off so many people for so many decades that now, in 1998, they've all turned on him. Silk's character assassination is partly owing to what the novel's narrator, Nathan Zuckerman, calls "the Devil of the Little Place--the gossip, the jealousy, the acrimony, the boredom, the lies."

But shocking, intensely dramatized events precipitate Silk's crisis. He remarks of two students who never showed up for class, "Do they exist or are they spooks?" They turn out to be black, and lodge a bogus charge of racism exploited by his enemies. Then, at 71, Viagra catapults Silk into "the perpetual state of emergency that is sexual intoxication," and he ignites an affair with an illiterate janitor, Faunia Farley, 34. She's got a sharp sensibility, "the laugh of a barmaid who keeps a baseball bat at her feet in case of trouble," and a melancholy voluptuousness. "I'm back in the tornado," Silk exults. His campus persecutors burn him for it--and his main betrayer is Delphine Roux.

In a short space, it's tough to convey the gale-force quality of Silk's rants, or the odd effect of Zuckerman's narration, alternately retrospective and torrentially in the moment. The flashbacks to Silk's youth in New Jersey are just as important as his turbulent forced retirement, because it turns out that for his entire adult life, Silk has been covering up the fact that he is a black man. (If this seems implausible, consider that the famous New York Times book critic Anatole Broyard did the same thing.) Young Silk rejects both the racism that bars him from Woolworth's counter and the Negro solidarity of Howard University. "Neither the they of Woolworth's nor the we of Howard" is for Coleman Silk. "Instead the raw I with all its agility. Self-discovery--that was the punch to the labonz.... Self-knowledge but concealed. What is as powerful as that?"

Silk's contradictions power a great Philip Roth novel, but he's not the only character who packs a punch. Faunia, brutally abused by her Vietnam vet husband (a sketchy guy who seems to have wandered in from a lesser Russell Banks novel), scarred by the death of her kids, is one of Roth's best female characters ever. The self-serving Delphine Roux is intriguingly (and convincingly) nutty, and any number of minor characters pop in, mouth off, kick ass, and vanish, leaving a vivid sense of human passion and perversity behind. You might call it a stain. --Tim Appelo --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly
Roth almost never fails to surprise. After a clunky beginning, in which crusty Nathan Zuckerman is carrying on about the orgy of sanctimoniousness surrounding Clinton's Monica misadventures, his new novel settles into what would seem to be patented Roth territory. Coleman Silk, at 71 a distinguished professor at a small New England college, has been harried from his position because of what has been perceived as a racist slur. His life is ruined: his wife succumbs under the strain, his friends are forsaking him, and he is reduced to an affair with 34-year-old Faunia Farley, the somber and illiterate janitor at the college. It is at this point that Zuckerman, Roth's novelist alter ego, gets to know and like Silk and to begin to see something of the personal and sexual liberation wrought in him by the unlikely affair with Faunia. It is also the point at which Faunia's estranged husband Les Farley, a Vietnam vet disabled by stress, drugs and drink, begins to take an interest in the relationship. So far this is highly intelligent, literate entertainment, with a rising tension. Will Les do something violent? Will Delphine Roux, the young French professor Silk had hired, who has come to hate him, escalate the college's campaign against him? Yes, but she now wants to make something of his Faunia relationship too. Then, in a dazzling coup, Roth turns all expectations on their heads, and begins to show Silk in a new and astounding light, as someone who has lived a huge lie all his life, making the fuss over his alleged racism even more surreal. The book continues to unfold layer after layer of meaning. There is a tragedy, as foretold, and an exquisitely imagined ending in which Zuckerman himself comes to feel both threatened and a threat. Roth is working here at the peak of his imaginative skills, creating many scenes at once sharply observed and moving: Faunia's affinity for the self-contained remoteness of crows, Farley's profane longing for a cessation to the tumult in his head, Zuckerman delightedly dancing with Silk to the big band tunes of their youth. He even brings off virtuoso passages that are superfluous but highly impressive, like his dissection of the French professor's lonely anguish in the States. This is a fitting capstone to the trilogy that includes American Pastoral and I Married a Communist--a book more balanced and humane than either, and bound, because of its explosive theme, to be widely discussed. 100,000 first printing.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (May 8, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0099422131
• ISBN-13: 978-0375726347
• ASIN: 0375726349
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (202 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #14,862 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

60 of 63 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Unknowable and Elusive Truth, November 8, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The Human Stain (Hardcover)

The Human Stain completes Philip Roth's thematic American trilogy, a meditation on the historical forces in the latter half of the twentieth century that have destroyed many innocent lives. In this trilogy, Roth takes devastating aim at the "American dream" and its empty promises of prosperity, freedom and everlasting happiness.

The trilogy began with American Pastoral, which some believe to be the high point in Roth's career. American Pastoral explored the effects of late-sixties radicalism on the idyllic life of Swede Levov and his family. I Married a Communist, the second book of the trilogy, was somewhat of a disappointment after the near-perfect American Pastoral, but it was still an engrossing story about the McCarthy era, a portrait of a country in which paranoia had displaced reason, allowing rumor and innuendo to run rampant and ruin lives.

The Human Stain closes the trilogy and brings us to the year 1998. The United States is awash in the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal and citizens feel the "ecstasy of sanctimony;" they are ready to accuse, blame and punish a very good president for what amounts to nothing more than the sexual peccadilloes almost every person becomes involved in at some time during his life.

On its surface, The Human Stain condemns the political correctness of McCarthyism that effectively turns college campuses away from creative thought and toward middle-aged, white, male oppression at any cost. Does this make The Human Stain a campus satire? Yes, but it is so much more and those who think it is not are simply missing the book's deepest level. It is, at its heart, a sad and poignant statement on the very essence of human nature, a statement that, in Roth's talented hands, becomes utterly convincing. It reminds us of our very unpraiseworthy proclivity to condemn, sully and even find some secret and voluptuous joy in ruining the name of others and delivering their lives into the hands of misery. The real truth, Roth tells us, is both "endless" and unknowable, no matter how much we may wish to label it with our petty accusations. Most of us, however, find this unknowability unacceptable, and so, we leave our own unmistakable "human stain" in our wake.

Coleman Silk, Roth's protagonist in The Human Stain, understands truth's unknowablility all too well. This seventy-one year old professor, who was once a beloved classicist of Athena College, now faces a scandal much like the one faced by President Clinton. And, like Clinton, Silk has done a very good job; his efforts as dean have left their mark of excellence. Athena College is all the better for his having been there, just as the United States is all the better for the Clinton years. Nevertheless, Silk finds himself accused of being both a racist and a misogynist.

Shamed publicly, Silk does exact revenge, but revenge for what? What exactly is the truth in this matter? While those in Silk's community want to see "truth" as a matter of black and white, the novel's narrator, Nathan Zuckerman tells us that "truth," at least in this case, if not in every case, is something that is more nuanced, more grey. And, in a delightfully ironic twist, we learn that Silk has a secret to share, one that makes his accusers turn beet-red with embarrassment rather than with exhilaration.

Nathan Zuckerman, Roth's own alter-ego, has appeared in eight of his novels, including the first two of this trilogy. He is the man in whom the reader must place his trust, or his mistrust. Zuckerman willingly admits that he knows only certain facts about his protagonists, that he must rely on his own innate gift for storytelling to convince us of the things that he, himself, sees so clearly, and that we are certainly free to accept or deny his version as we will.

Roth could have chosen to tell his story from the vantage point of an objective, omniscient narrator and thus allowed us access to the thoughts and feelings of all the characters involved. At first glance, this might seem to have been the wiser choice. A second glance, however, will show us it would have been a travesty, an audacious claim to actually know what the elusive and unknowable truth really is. Telling the story from the point-of-view of the highly subjective Zuckerman is tantamount to an admission of the elusiveness of truth; it is allowing us to form our own opinions without manipulation from either the author or from any of his characters. It is, genius.

If there is any blemish, however slight, in this wonderful literary achievement, it is the character of Les Farley. Les is the now-cliched Vietnam veteran; a man suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, the weary, misunderstood and maligned soldier who has been abandoned by a country for whom he was willing to give up his very life. Roth uses Farley as a plot device only, and he is one that fails to convince in an otherwise overwhelmingly convincing book.

Roth's prose is, as always, without rival. His Jamesian sentences twist and turn with a vitality and energy that, at times, can seem almost frantic. But Roth never jeopardizes his lucidity; he is a linguistic master who can take us on the most tumultuous ride with an ease and smoothness that other authors can only dream about.

The Human Stain is Philip Roth at the top of his form. It is also American fiction at its very finest and a book that is definitely not to be missed.

54 of 59 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An explosive broadside against the "ecstasy of sanctimony", May 5, 2000

By	Brooke276 (Denver, CO) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Human Stain (Hardcover)

More than an attack on the all-too-familiar topic of political correctness, Roth's new novel manages to encompass the entire culture of self-righteousness and MORAL correctness (which always assumes a more insidious form than the political). While some of the character developments are often less than compelling, the central story of Coleman Silk always remains strong and utterly fascinating. A key point, and often overlooked in reviews, is Roth's revelation (still unknown to many at this late date) of the ambiguity and arbitrary nature of racial classification. If Silk is to be considered black despite being as light as any white man, what does that do to our sense of "innate" and "immutable" racial features? As with morality, holding rigid ideological beliefs about race does little but lead to tragic misunderstandings and a failure to perceive complexity. Despite some detours, Roth is an exceptional writer, always insightful and willing to tackle contemporary controversies without fear. Some might be distracted by the allusions to the Clinton-Lewinsky affair, but it does serve its purpose: intelligent, important men are often brought down by their sexual impulses, but such acts should never outweigh other aspects of character and achievement. That we need to be reminded of this time after time is quite sad, but Roth would rather we not forget it. Overall, neither "liberal" nor "conservative" in the conventional sense, but an indictment of a hypocritical society bent on using obfuscation and euphemism to create an environment where, to paraphrase Roth, "what is being said is not what is really going on."

26 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Secrets and lies in the search for self, June 12, 2000

By	"scottish_lawyer" (Edinburgh, Scotland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Human Stain (Hardcover)

The Human Stain is not the best of recent Roth (but then there are few contemporary novels from whatever country as impressive as Sabbath's Theater or American Pastoral). However, it is confirmation that Roth is one of the most necessary of contemporary writers.

This concludes a trilogy of loosely related novels taking a personal examination of important events from post WWII American history. Each is narrated by Nathan Zuckerman (Roth's altar ego), and again Zuckerman is present, but - generally - not intrusive.

Set against the backdrop of the Lewinsky affair, Coleman's own fall from his position as Professor of Classics and dean of a department for a "racist" remark is a tragedy, and filled with anger, on behalf of his friend, Zuckerman traces Silk's life, and his final days (including an affair with a cleaner at the University).

Roth's writing has a passion. His prose may not be smooth and elegant, but there is real emotion underpinning it. Anger at the nature of modern society, the dumbing down, the compartmentalising of people.

Roth's characters are more rounded than in the first Zuckerman trilogy. His subjects now seem real. His writing about a writer, and his problems writing seems to be behind him.

This is a book about learning, about ignorance, about dignity, about shame.

It can be contrasted with the cool prose of JM Coetzee's Disgrace, winner of the Booker Prize in the UK. This novel looks at the fall of an academic after an affair with a student. It is a well written but cold novel. No-one can accuse Roth/Zuckerman of writing cold fiction.

The novel is uneven, but there is much that is poetic in the midst of the righteous anger. Also, in Les Farley, and Ernestine Silk Roth has created two of his most memorable characters.

Many years ago Roth wrote a hilarious baseball novel, The Great American Novel. Roth's recent work (beginning I feel with Deception) has been of an extremely high quality. And it is with this body of work, rather than in that thirty year old fiction, that Roth has finally caught that mythical beast. The cumulative work of the new Zuckerman trilogy and Sabbath's Theater truly are Great American Novels.