In fact, Roth doesn’t emphasize the emotions as much as I would have expected. The fact of the matter, though, it that this kind of story is emotional enough because of the subject matter that the emotional beats don’t actually have to be hit that hard to have an effect. There are some recollections that, in my opinion, did not belong in the novel most of Patrimony is about Roth’s relationship with his father, but there are a few that seemed to serve little purpose aside from reminding the reader that Roth is a well-known writer.
There are some sections that simply go on for too long. I do have to say that that Roth’s editors should have been a little stricter, though. Patrimony is easy to read but, as I mentioned, it is very emotional. The writing is, for the most part, very good. I didn’t even like Roth’s father-he is grumpy, rude, kinda self-righteous, and just plain awful to his poor girlfriend Lil-and I found myself getting upset as things kept getting worse and worse. I personally prefer not to think about things like arranging for a parent’s will and/or life support plan. It is about Roth’s experiences with his very grumpy, very sick father and because of that it’s painful. Admittedly I had to speed read it to get it done before the book club meeting, but I was able to get through it in one day pretty comfortably. Considering that memoirs aren’t necessarily my thing, and my preference for the memoirs that I do read is for those written either a) by writers about the craft of writing or b) by comedians, I did enjoy Patrimony. While I’m not exactly jumping up and down with excitement over this one, I liked it fine.
In Patrimony, Roth writes about his experiences during the last period of his father’s life, during which his eighty-six year old father struggles with the effects of–and decisions regarding–a giant brain tumor. I read this since one of my coworkers is leading a book club on it, and I like to keep up on book club books even if I’m not in charge of discussion. Patrimony is the winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, which is an award that I have never heard of, but it sounds impressive. A quick Google search has informed me that that is my bad, though, since he is very well regarded writer who has been awarded many awards. It is also kind of an odd choice even in that category since I’d never read anything of Roth’s before or even heard of him. I generally don’t read a lot of memoirs, so Patrimony by Philip Roth is a step or two outside of my comfort zone.
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