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Shop nowAn American Type
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Learn moreDiscovered posthumously, this final novel by the author of the greatest American immigrant novel, Call It Sleep, reintroduces us to its protagonist, Roth’s alter ego, Ira, who abandons his controlling lover, Edith, in favor of a blond, aristocratic pianist at Yaddo. The ensuing conflict between his Jewish ghetto roots and his high-flown, writerly aspirations forces Ira to abandon his family temporarily for the sun-soaked promise of the American West.
Fast-paced but wrenching, set against a backdrop of crumbling piers, bedbug-infested SROs, and skyscrapers in glimmering Manhattan and seedy LA, An American Type is perhaps the last firsthand testament of the Depression, as well as a universal statement about the constant reinvention of American identity and the transcendence of love.
Henry Roth (1906–1995), European-born American novelist and short-story writer, was the author of Call It Sleep, Mercy of a Rude Stream, and An American Type.
Anthony Heald, an Audie Award–winning narrator, has earned Tony nominations and an Obie Award for his theater work; appeared in television’s Law & Order, The X-Files, Miami Vice, and Boston Public; and starred as Dr. Frederick Chilton in the 1991 Oscar-winning film The Silence of the Lambs. Heald has also won numerous AudioFile Earphones Awards. He lives in Ashland, Oregon, with his family.
Reviews
“Mr. Roth’s innovative use of language…is both beautiful and highly realistic…Although there is no style called Rothian, there should be.”
“A sweeping portrait of 1930s America and the story of a writer struggling with art, love, and finding his own voice.”
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