Day: May 18, 2011

 In celebration of Mr. Roth’s win of the Man Booker International Prize!

“The only obsession everyone wants: ‘love.’ People think that in falling in love they make themselves whole? The Platonic union of souls? I think otherwise. I think you’re whole before you begin. And the love fractures you. You’re whole, and then you’re cracked open.”
The Dying Animal

 

“All that we don’t know is astonishing. Even more astonishing is what passes for knowing.“
The Human Stain

 

“Nor had I understood til then how the shameless vanity of utter fools can so strongly determine the fate of others.“
The Plot Against America

 

“Good Christ, a Jewish man with parents alive is a fifteen-year-old boy, and will remain a fifteen-year-old boy till they die.”
Portnoy’s Complaint

 

“Life is just a short period of time in which you are alive.“
American Pastoral

 

“As for himself, however hateful life was, it was hateful in a home and not in the gutter. Many Americans hated their homes. The number of homeless in America couldn’t touch the number of Americans who had homes and families and hated the whole thing.“
Sabbath’s Theater

 

“People are unjust to anger — it can be enlivening and a lot of fun.“
The Counterlife

 

“The legend engraved on the face of the Jewish nickel– on the body of every Jewish child!– not IN GOD WE TRUST, but SOMEDAY YOU’LL BE A PARENT AND YOU’LL KNOW WHAT IT’S LIKE.“
Portnoy’s Complaint

 

“Nothing keeps its promise.“
Sabbath’s Theater

 

“You don’t have to work in a mental hospital to know about husbands and wives.“
Sabbath’s Theater

via telegraph.co.uk

Congratulations, Mr. Roth! Of course, you’re controversial, but in my book, you’re worthy of the Man Booker Prize!

Philip Roth was awarded The Man Booker Prize , it was announced this morning on the prize’s website. The prize is worth close to $100,000. The Guardian reports:

The author, a perennial contender for the Nobel prize in literature, was named winner of the Man Booker International at the Sydney Writers’ Festival today, beating a stellar, if eclectic, shortlist. Also in the running were the British children’s author Philip Pullman, award-winning Chinese writer Su Tong, American authors Anne Tyler and Marilynne Robinson, Australia’s David Malouf and a reluctant John le Carré

.

This award, given every two years, honors a body of work instead of a single work. John le Carré, tried to have his name withdrawn from the shortlist.

But that was just the beginning of the controversy. While some are celebrating Roth’s win with a collection of his most miserable quotes about life, others are up in arms over his win. Judge Carmen Callil quit in protest over the decision and is quoted in The Guardian:

I don’t rate him as a writer at all. I made it clear that I wouldn’t have put him on the longlist, so I was amazed when he stayed there. He was the only one I didn’t admire – all the others were fine,” said Callil, who will explain why she believes Roth is not a worthy winner in an outspoken column in the Guardian Review on Saturday 21 May. “Roth goes to the core of their [Cartwright and Gekoski’s] beings. But he certainly doesn’t go to the core of mine … Emperor’s clothes: in 20 years’ time will anyone read him?

What do you think? Was she right or is Roth a literary giant worthy of the prize?

 

Quick Poll

Did Roth deserve the Booker for the body of his work or would you have quit if you were a judge too?

Totally deserved it

76.47%

 

Yeah, I’d quit too

23.53%