Novels & Major Fiction Codexery

Herzog (novel)

A novel of letters from a midlife-crisis professor.

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Saul Bellow's 1964 novel Herzog incorporates letters from its main character, Moses E. Herzog, as a structural device.[1] According to Time magazine in 2005, the novel was selected as one of the 100 best English-language novels published since the magazine's 1923 founding.[2]

Making and release

The story is told entirely from Herzog's point of view, alternating between first-person and third-person narration.[3] Herzog's relationships with women, friends, society, and himself form the novel's central theme.[4] Both Lamont and Ludwig reviewed Herzog without mentioning these autobiographical elements.[5] Ludwig favorably described the novel as "a major breakthrough"[5]

Asked about the similarities, Bellow said, "I don't know that that sort of thing is really relevant"[6][7] Bellow added, "Let's both be bigger than that".[6][7] The letters Herzog composes reveal his own mental processes and reflections.[4] Rosette C. Lamont, a French professor whom Bellow dated after his divorce from Sondra, was the basis for the character Ramona.[8]

What the cited sources add

The New York Times book reviewer exulted that "no writer need pretend in his fiction that his education stopped in the eighth grade"[9] Bellow said in an interview that Herzog realizes his intellectual "privilege" has proved to be "another form of bondage"[9] Irving Howe wrote of the protagonist's consciousness, "We are made captive in the world of Herzog"[3] The descriptions of characters' emotions and physical features are rich in wit and energy.[4][10]

References

  1. Wikipedia, "Herzog (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "National Book Awards 1965", National Book Foundation (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  2. Wikipedia, "Herzog (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Kelly, "TIME'S List of the 100 Best Novels", 2010-01-06; Lacayo, "Herzog", 2010-01-07 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  3. Wikipedia, "Herzog (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Moynahan, "The Way Up From Rock Bottom", Times, 1964-09-20; Mencken, "The Critic as Artist: Essays on Books, 1920-1970", W. W. Norton & Company, 1972, p. 184 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  4. Wikipedia, "Herzog (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Dipple, "The Unresolvable Plot: Reading Contemporary Fiction", Routledge, 1988, p. 213 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  5. Wikipedia, "Herzog (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Menand, "Young Saul", 2015-05-11, p. 71–76 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  6. Wikipedia, "Herzog (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Bellow, "Conversations with Saul Bellow", Univ. Press of Mississippi, 1994, p. 99 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  7. Open Library record, ISBN 9780878057184 ("Conversations with Saul Bellow"). CC0 (metadata); book content not read. openlibrary.org
  8. Wikipedia, "Herzog (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Heer, "Bellow's Emulators", The Walrus, 2010-11-08; "Saul Bellow's Revenge Novel", Condé Nast, 2015-05-04 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  9. Wikipedia, "Herzog (novel)" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Moynahan, "The Way Up From Rock Bottom", Times, 1964-09-20; Bellow, "Conversations with Saul Bellow: A Collection of Selected Interviews", Academic Foundation, 1993, p. 63; Pifer, "Saul Bellow: Against the Grain", University of Pennsylvania Press, 1991, p. 115 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  10. Open Library record, ISBN 9780415006620 ("The unresolvable plot"). CC0 (metadata); book content not read. openlibrary.org

Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Herzog (novel) (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.

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Sources

Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.

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