A Review of Philip Roths Novel Everyman - 1853 Words

Philip Roths novel Everyman (2006) describes death with a coldly realistic eye, although in ways that that offer no comfort for those hoping for atonement or second chances in the afterlife. Like the character in the medieval morality play by the same name, Roths Everyman is nameless, faceless and anonymous, although both had been materially successful in life. In the 15th Century play, God calls Everyman to account for his sins, but finally allows him into paradise after he confesses them and shows sincere repentance. Roths main character has no such comfort as his ghost watches his body being buried in an old Jewish cemetery in New Jersey. Few people mourn his passing, apart from his daughter, and no God or angels appear to bring him into paradise. Instead, after the mourners leave he converses with a black gravedigger and finally gives his a tip for performing an excellent burial. In reviewing his life, his greatest regret was ruining his three marriages, particularly his second m arriage to Phoebe, who divorced him when he had an affair with a 24-year old Danish model. Although Nancy, his daughter from that marriage, forgives him, Phoebe does not, nor do his sons from his first marriage. Everyman also realizes that no matter that he had made a great deal of money at the advertising agency where he had worked for so many years, he had really wanted to be an artist rather than a middle class success story. In the end, though, he can change none of this and his ghost does