Pynchon/Roth/Bellow/Updike on the 1960s

[Carvill John]

The current Vineland discussion, and the Updike/McEwan/Roth thread, made me think it would be interesting to read an in-depth analysis of how Roth, Pynchon, Bellow, and Updike dealt with the 'revolutions' of the 1960s. 
 
Bellow - not for the first or last time - courted controversy and accusations of racism - with Mr Sammler's Planet. Updike, in 'Rabit Redux', came unstuck when trying to depict a decade he clearly felt adrift in - page afetr page of Skeeter reading to Jill and Rabbit went noewhere. Roth's 'American Pastoral' began beautifully, but imho got bogged down in all the Angela Davis/Weathermen allusions and never really recovered - to my mind it was difficult to be sure what Roth was saying, and re-reading the book made me think this uncertainty extended to Roth himself, though maybe that was the point? Pynchon, of course, produced Vineland, which is currently being discussed.

Anyway, there's a Master's Thesis proposal for somebody....
 
Allison: I'm in the midst of doing my thesis. 
 
Alvy Singer: On what? 
 
Allison: Political commitment in twentieth century literature. 
 
Alvy Singer: You, you, you're like New York, Jewish, left-wing, liberal, intellectual, Central Park West, Brandeis University, the socialist summer camps and the, the father with the Ben Shahn drawings, right, and the really, y'know, strike-oriented kind of, red diaper, stop me before I make a complete imbecile of myself. 
 
Allison: No, that was wonderful. I love being reduced to a cultural stereotype.
 
Alvy Singer: Right, I'm a bigot, I know, but for the left. 
 
 
 

 
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