I really was not expecting this at all, which is why I am so thrown off. The end just changed any cohesive commentary I had accumulated about this book during the rather long time I was reading it. I had traveled down paths describing the book as "all-around American", and "love letter to a daughter"...but then that eventually turned into questions like "why do men think they love their daughters more than women do?" and "Women are so typically bitchy"...which then turned into mixed feelings about the Swede, and then ultimately "!?!?!?".
Does that make Roth a genius?
Okay I've calmed a bit now and am thinking a little bit more rationally. First order of business: the name Merry is very cute. Second order of business: I think Jews are innately brilliant. Think about it; Woody Allen, Ginsberg, Philip Glass (partly), etc etc. Apparently they are also effing sexy (aka Joseph Gordon Levitt, Scarlett Johansson, and apparently Alison Brie) - maybe I should convert and I can accrue some of these hottie points by default.
But now I am getting off track.
I really appreciate this book. At times very serene and beautiful, other times neurotic, but always truthful. It seems real - like actually having a conversation with someone, where you know you're only getting one side of the story and you know it's biased, but you also understand and respect the speaker enough to relate, because they are your friend. It also gave me this very tender look into fathers and gave me the perspective of loving a daughter that you remember to be a little girl, before things became complicated and dark. Perhaps if Merry were able to read this novel, things could start to be mended for the Levovs.
I blame Dawn for moving on, but yet I also blame Seymour for clinging to the past. I think if this were a film, I would like Dawn much more - honestly, I can relate to her actions, were I in her shoes...so perhaps that is a bit of self loathing that is holding my hand and leading me toward my slight distaste for her - but Seymour's (and his perception of how Merry feels about her) perspective really throws a wrench into compassion. Thinking on it though, I can see it being very difficult to write a story involving a husband's love for his daughter and his wife in a harmonious way. Not so much Oedipal, but...simultaneously keeping distinct and yet embracing the differences between romantic and paternal love.
It was also very difficult for me to imagine Merry as fat. I'm not sure what the true deal is, but to the Swede she was a smart, innocent angel, while as time went on it seemed more and more to me that she was in actuality a disgusting brat-turned lunatic. I wonder if families somewhere feel exactly this about the people I so often see on the street. Do the homeless in fact turn away the people that love them only to beg and yell at strangers who see them for what they really are?
I think I would benefit from reading this book again sometime, with all this knowledge under my belt now. But for the time being, onward ho!
