The Novel as Shrug

My Life as a Man By Philip Roth Holt, 330 pp., $8.95

The Jew in American Jewish fiction is passive: a Tar Baby catching punches. So, nu? If he were active, he’d be Christian. It’s no wonder the Super Jew of modern Israel—energetic, warlike, frankly Calvinist—has made few feature appearances in Bellow, Malamud, Richler, Markfield, Singer, Roth. He seems eccentric and goyish, what with his uncircumcised Protestant work ethic. On the other hand Jewish parents send their disorganized, unsuccessful sons and daughters to a kibbutz for three months’ occupational therapy. All over New York you meet these young and enthusiastic outpatients of Israel. It’s the second frontier.