Indignation - a review

Indignation by Phillip Roth

Houghton-Mifflin Company

Boston-New York 2008 $26.00

This novel touches on many topics including family life, Jews, College, War and growing up amidst all of that. Thus it is about change. Young people and parents who are looking at college should read this about “the impact of American history on the vulnerable individual.”

The story is of an angry man going to college and his inexperience, foolishness, intellectual and sexual conflicts and discovery, the impact of rules and family, fear of war, courage and risk taking.

I enjoyed the book and read it twice to get the full impact of its meaning. It is set in the same period I was in college and seminary, the era of the Korean War in the fifties. Roth is one of my favorite authors and is always a surprise, intellectually stimulating and emotionally jolting.