In the Roth Archives: The Evolution of Philip Roth's Kepesh Trilogy

Abstract

As least narratively coherent of Roth's recurrent narrators, David Kepesh is also one of Roth's most enigmatic characters. Perhaps this is excusable; Roth wrote Kepesh novels during vastly different eras, and, as such, they reflect vastly different interests. For all frustration this can induce in readers desiring a clearly-defined trilogy, arguably Kepesh's incongruity and ambiguity helped Dying Animal (2001), third and final novel in Kepesh trilogy, receive a significant amount of scholarly attention in recent years. Velichka Ivanova and Debra Shostak are among critics who convincingly interpret novel as a critique of certain kinds of toxic masculinity. In addition, Shostak evaluates how Kepesh trilogy explore[s] consequences for sexuality and self-concept when gendered perspective of a consciousness shifts position (Countertexts 7)-highlighting ludic skittishness of trilogy as a unit.Scholars have remarked very little on this skittishness and have largely considered first two novels in trilogy to be a faint embarassment. For example, in his monograph Philip Roth, David Brauner makes an indicative argument that The Dying Animal is, along with other Kepesh novels, among [Roth's] weaker (223). Whilst increase in scholarly work done on Dying Animal has mitigated this, little work on previous two novels exists,2 resulting in an absence of scholarship that offers prolonged examinations of construction of books as a trilogy. As such, gap between first Kepesh novel (The Breast, 1972) and second (The Professor of Desire, 1977) is particularly important insofar as it reflects a commitment on Roth's part to avoid a linear narrative of either surreal Kafkan fantasy or Bildungsroman character study.The rise in studies of Kepesh novels (or, at least, figure of Kepesh as represented in Dying Animal) has been coterminous with scholarly usage of Philip Roth Papers in Library of Congress, an archive whose vast collections of Roth-related material remain underutilized in Roth scholarship to date-although it has been deployed in recent works by Shostak, Patrick Hayes, and Josh Lambert, amongst others. These trends are crucial to this article, as is Shostak's notion of the gendered perspective of a consciousness shift[ing] position, a conception of trilogy that accounts for Roth's penchant for abrupt transformation and narrative inconsistency.This article argues that perceived faults of Kepesh novels can mask their more subtle usefulness for Roth scholarship; in particular, by exploring differences in first two Kepesh novels, a sense of their significance within Roth's work can emerge. Beginning with a close reading of unfinished sequels to Breast, this article will first track paths not taken and explore what their absence reveals about text that would become Professor of Desire. Branching into a discussion of unusual publication history of Breast, this article will then explore how Roth came to modify text, positing that such changes evidence an uncertainty over novel's representation of psychoanalysis in particular. Finally, this article will discuss how techniques it has employed can provide a platform for a reexamination not only of value of these works, but of role of psychoanalysis in Roth's career more broadly.1. UNFINISHED SEQUELS TO THE BREASTThe Breast did not remain a static text in Roth's bibliography. Evidence from both Philip Roth Papers and subsequent published versions of text reveal novella to be in a consistently uncertain position; whilst it arguably represents a definable cultural moment (the growing disenchantment with psychoanalysis amongst American intelligentsia), it is also demonstrably a work that Roth agonized over as his career progressed. This instability deepens sense of fundamental unease that is detectable on a contextual, theoretical, and narrative level within novel. …