It's Summer, 1944. In the 'stifling heat of equatorial Newark', a terrifying epidemic is raging, threatening the children of the New Jersey city with maiming, paralysis, life-long disability, even death. Vigorous, decent, twenty-three year old playground director Bucky Cantor is devoted to his charges and disappointed with himself because his weak eyes have excluded him from serving in the war. As polio begins to ravage Bucky's playground, Roth leads us through every inch of emotion such a pestilence can breed: the fear, the panic, the anger, the bewilderment, the suffering and the pain. Through this story runs the dark question that haunts all four of Roth's late short novels, "Everyman", "Indignation", "The Humbling", and now, "Nemesis": What choices fatally shape a life? How powerless is each of us up against the force of circumstances?
| ISBN | 0099542269 | | Pages | 304 | | ISBN13 | 9780099542261
(What's this?) | | Weight (grammes) | 217 | | Publisher | Vintage | | Published in | London | | Imprint | Vintage | | Height (mm) | 198 | | Format | Paperback | | Width (mm) | 129 | | Publication date | 30 Apr 2011 | | Spine width (mm) | 19 | | DEWEY | 813.54 | | Academic level | General | | DEWEY edition | DC22 | |
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"Roth's book has the elegance of a fable and the tragic inevitability of a Greek drama."--"The New Yorker" "An artfully constructed, suspenseful novel with a cunning twist towards the end."--J. M. Coetzee, "New York Review of Books" "Elegant. . . . Suffused with precise and painful tenderness. . . . Stands out for its warmth." --"The New York Times Book Review" "Painful and powerful. . . . Somberly but vividly, [Roth] recreates the panic and fear triggered by polio." --"USA Today" "A perfectly proportioned Greek tragedy played out against the background of the polio epidemic that swept Newark, New Jersey, during the summer of 1944." --"Financial Times"" " "Like a very well-executed O. Henry story. . . . A parable about the embrace of conscience. . . .and what its suffocating, life-denying consequences can be." -Michiko Kakutani, "The""New York Times" "Yet another small triumph from one of our native artists largest in spirit. And by small Ia
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