1. So, a few thoughts about Lenny Bruce, pop art, Philip Guston, & Philip Roth.
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2. Philip Roth came of age in the 1950s, and his first three books (Goodbye, Columbus, Letting Go, When She War Good) are kind of Iowa MFA books, written with the Flaubertian detachment taught in creative writing school.
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3. Portnoy's Complaint (1969 -- nice!) was a breakthrough for Roth because he broke with the stiffness of 1950s modernism & embraced the vernacular. The novel was closer to stand-up comedy than Flaubert.
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4. I actually think stand-up comedy influenced Roth. He was in Chicago in 1950s when Nichols & May were revolutionizing comedy with therapy-inflected relationship comedy that anticipates Roth.
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5. Lenny Bruce too was an influence -- Roth was close friends with Albert Goldman, who was a big on Bruce and would write the (admittedly) hostile biography.
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6. Before Portnoy was published, Roth apparently would try bits and pieces out on friends at parties as a spiel, a stand-up routine (which was very popular).
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7. One way to understand Roth's trajectory in 1950s-1960s is its the same journey made by his painter friend Philip Guston from abstract expressionism to pop art.
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8. Guston's anti-Nixon drawings were one of the inspirations for Roth's anti-Nixon joke book, Our Gang. In books of 1960s and 1970s, Roth, like Guston, learned power of caricature.
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9. My more extended thoughts on Philip Roth here:https://newrepublic.com/article/148506/philip-roth-mandarin-joker …
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