Customer Reviews

Portnoy's Complaint

5 star:		(35)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I haven't read such a disappointing book in my life (this year so far)! It started off interesting, funny, meaningful - I thought he'd go somewhere with it. Off the deep-end?

Absolutely NOTHING was accomplished with this novel and I don't feel I've gained anything from it. The main character, Alexander Portnoy, simply recounts a series of sexual encounters - with women, glass milk bottles, pieces of raw meat - the whole book just turned into a farce, needling in on the same obsession over and over. Does everyone with an overbearing mother sexually assault raw animal flesh?

If this is definitive Jewish-American literature, something is seriously wrong and a re-assessment should be in order. This garbage is going directly to my bird's cage. Better lining than literature.

Philip Roth has to be the greatest self-loathing Jewish man alive, or at least one lucky enough to make a career out of it.

Roth's style remindes me of occasions where people speak out loud to themselves when they are angry with a situation.It was very tiring for me to read a book thats written enntirely in this style.the impression you get is that this guy is hitting his head with a hammer to get ideas to fill the pages of this book instead of visiting a psychiatric and talk about his childhood.all those details about Jew families,thousands of horrible lines about sex that are supposed to be funny....writting diaries not for publication would be better for this writer.it was his only book i read and i dont intent to read more

Like Charles Dickens, I had great expectations for this book. Well let me clarify that, Charles Dickens was fairly dead before this book was written and had he been alive, he may or may not had the desire to pick Roth's "Portnoy's Complaint", so let me qualify. Hearing the glowing reviews and seeing the listmania lists placing Roth's "Complaint" as a must read had me fairly in a frenzy to read this one. Does it stand out as a truly unique must-read from all the more than mediocre literature out there? I don't think so. That's not to say it has achieved mediocrity, it is somewhat above that.

What a reader gets from "Portnoy's Complaint," is a window inside the psyche of a Jewish American boy come boy-man smothered by a truly overbearing mother and plagues throughout life by a sexual obsession that keeps him from being committed to a human relationship. His commitments seem to be centered around desires emanating somewhere about his mid-region and early on seem to be mostly of the self-satisfactory kind. This translates into adulthood to a dogged pursuit of shallow relationships with WASP-ish women. So, there is plenty of Freud infused throughout. And interestingly enough it transmogrifies into Jung, with Alexander Portnoy grasping the collective unconscious of his Jewish ethnicity getting back at the established American gentility through sex. If any of this makes you squeamish, you may want to steer clear.

It was a book that definitely pushed the boundaries of the time in the 1960's but then again there was a whole cultural movement all about pushing the boundaries back then. However, like most boundary pushers of the times, we seemed to have lowered our tolerance for the racy and compared to literature today of the same ilk, Portnoy is fairly tame.

Do you have to be Jewish to really "get" this book? Well, I'm not and there was probably 10% of the book that went right over or around my head. Yiddish references were completely lost on me, but through repeat word usage most readers can probably get the gist. Portnoy's is kind of like a mix of Woody Allen and Henry Miller. It's short and written with an inner voice of a psychotherapy recipient spewing forth from the coach of self-analysis. It's a good piece of literature, but I'm not so sure about a great one. Read this is you are interested in what it may be like to be a Jewish-American man growing up in an oppressive family atmosphere. Read this if you want a good chuckle at sometimes raunchy but talented writing. If these things don't appeal to you at this time, move on to other reads on your list of literary desires.
--MMW

I read Portnoy's Complaint and was surprised by how bad it was. It's a long, reflective monolog, which is a difficult endeavor for any writer, especially when they're bad like Philip Roth. The narrative is being told to a doctor, so I will no fill the role of the doctor with a critique of the book.

"Right...Talk faster, get to the point...Why would you do that... Yes, I understand: you're a Jew stereotype and a pervert.... Yes, got it, Jew. Shut up with that already, I don't care...you already told me that...Talk faster...Talk faster.... You are taking too long with your story and I'm losing interest....Okay, I've had enough. Are you almost done? No! You're not? How can that be? You've been talking for so long....Shut up....Shut up already....That's it, I'm either leaving or killing you....Well, you've asked for it...That's it, you're done....That wasn't funny at all. Why did you think that that would keep me here....Good, you're done. Excellent, not your story but you being finished."

People kept calling this book funny. Where's the funny? I didn't see any funny. Some of the phrases were amusing, and I chuckled because of some anecdotes, but then he kept going with them. Just going and going. If you want a funny book, get one by Woody Allen. If you want a coaster, this will suffice.

This book threw me for a loop right from the get go. I had no idea this wasn't a novel in the conventional sense with chapters and multiple dialogues.
It turned out to be the tribes and tribulations of Alexander Portnoy. A thirtysomething academic sprawled out on his Shrink's couch ranting about his reason for his excessive kinky sexual exploits and inclinations. We are also shown his growing up (in a Jewish Household,) with an overly doting mother and a stern insecure father; and how they were responsible for his neurosis. His parents are similar to the parents of Seinfeld if you ever watched that show.
It doesn't matter if you're Jewish to read this novel, because if you have ever heard your grandfathers or fathers talk about the "old days" you will relate one way of another.
Philip Roth was very candid in his sexual adventures, throwing just about every taboo out there into the mix. I do admit he speaks harshly about his girlfriends or sex friends being more like it. Also I found it amusing, since growing up in New Jersey, to read about places in Jersey City and Newark that I go to all the time.
Just an aside, the best way to read this book is to imagine you are Portnoy and you are ranting to a Psychiatrist (who never speaks, amusingly until the end)
The Book is the mental ramblings of our main character and after a while the book does have a rough structure and it reads like a comedic Show, I enjoyed it, but it is not an easy read because of it's unorthodox structure, it's somewhat sexist treatment of people and it's harsh opinions of religion. One thing is for certain, no one is safe from the comedic whit of Philip Roth.

One reviewer here complains that "Roth's style remindes me of occasions where people speak out loud to themselves when they are angry with a situation" umm... DUH ... the main character is doing exactly that! He is speaking from the couch in his doctor's (shrink's) office. Even if some do not like the content there is no mistaking that Roth is a writer of great caliber and as far as I'm concerned this book is funny, interesting and extremely well written. I highly recommend.

I can't get over Philip Roth; he rants and he whines and he obsesses...and instead of being annoying it is hilarious! Between the sarcasm and the self deprication, you may find the sad little voice of a confused child reaching out to you for help. But in the great words of Tennesse Williams (or Paul Newman, the reason I've memorized some of Williams' words) "How can one drowning man save another drowning man?". Exactly. Reading this book frustrated me; yes i have these problems, yes i recognize them, now what? All of the history, the digressions, the humor boils down to nothing and that is the biggest flaw of the book. Go forth, read, be entertained! But don't expect and you will not be disappointed. (Always a good philosophy on life by the way.)

Definitely one of the best books I've ever read... a wonderful concoction of [] intellect, humour and brilliant writing. A Jewish man sits on a psychiatrist's chair and rants...he raves and screams and howls and grumbles..... his name is Alexander Portnoy - a genius with a 158 IQ, but also a notorious sex fiend and a man obsessed with his religious background. So vividly and so viscerally does he express his mental anguish that the reader feels an adrenalin rush as they skim through the pages of the book .... I found myself whizzing through the novel and I wasn't bored for a second....anything but! I was amused, delighted, fascinated and yes, I wanted to quote just about every single sentence that came out of Portnoy's mouth....about his relationship with "The Monkey" (no, not a pet babboon, but actually the name he bestows upon one of his girlfriends...a woman on whom he exercises his more selfish and sadistic streak), about their relationship, he retorts "she puts the id back in Yid and I put the oy back in Goy"....a sentence that will hold a whole new load of meaning for those who read the book....its emphasis on the Jewish-Gentile conflict, as seen from Portnoy's obsessive-compulsive point of view, is profound. Here, I'm tempted to stress the fact that the book may appear to be nothing more than a tirade on Semitism, but actually, it is much more universal than that....it is an indictment of ALL forms of religious bigotry, as Portnoy has renounced his religion and labelled himself an atheist. It's merely a co-incidence that Portnoy happens to be Jewish. Had he hailed from a family of devout Buddhists or Christians, his wrath towards those religions would have been just as strong. There's definitely a deep-rooted atheist philosophy underlying the book....and there's also a liberal and thrilling portrayal of sex and sexual deviance.....enjoy!! From onanism to fetishism to scenes of kinky defecation (somehow reminiscent of "Tropic of Cancer"), the book is a romp...at times endearing and at times plain shocking...but always entertaining. And through all his sexual misdemeanours, one thing is a constant....Portnoy's pangs of guilt....he feels remorse and agony and experiences bouts of thinking and re-thinking over everything he does....and thats his "complaint." Don't hesitate, read this book, its AMAZING.

I read this book years ago when I was a teenager. I just read it again at age 50. I laughed so hard I cried. As a woman it has given me a new perspective as to what some men (probably many men) experience.

This is one of my favorite books and for many reasons. Roth's writing, while seemingly over-the-top is actually a tightly controlled, rippingly savage attack on all sorts of sacred cows: post-WWII America, polite society, Jewish traditions in America, family relations, the psychiatric trends of the 1960s, and so much more. Sure, Alexander Portnoy is one of the most repugnant anti-heroes in American literature but that doesn't distract from Roth's intelligent word play. The set-up, with a self-absorbed and self-obsessed patient venting wildly to an unseen psychiatrist, gives Roth plenty of opportunity to play around while ploughing through the "story" of Alexander Portnoy's life. The riffs allow for plenty of flashbacks and flash forwards, exotic wordplay, and larger-than-life characterizations. The highly personal nature of Portnoy's complaining obviously gets ribald, but that doesn't make this a "..." piece of literature. Portnoy emerges as a ... jerk--though a thoroughly entertaining jerk.

This is a book to read, re-read, and re-read again. There's lots of gold to be found here.