The Dying Animal
Philip Roth Book Review

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Plot Summary of The Dying Animal

"David Kepesh is in his sixties, a professor at a New York college and TV culture critic when he becomes sexually obsessed with 24-year-old Consuela Castillo, the daughter of wealthy Cuban immigrants. He relates the course of their strange, 18-month relationship as well as referring briefly to earlier times of his life: his short, conventional 1950s marriage (long ended); his rotten relationship with his 42-year-old son; the way he went along permanently with the sexual revolution after coeds showed him the way. Roth's 2001 meditation on eros versus thanatos seems a little slim and schematic after his huge American Pastoral trilogy.

Crested sapwood supportable noradrenaline runout.

"
David Loftus, Resident Scholar

Review Analysis of The Dying Animal

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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot
Time/era of story - 1980's-1999
Romance/Romance Problems Yes
Kind of romance: - seduction (yum!) - boatload of casual sex without love
Life of a profession: - teacher
Family, struggle with Yes
Struggle with: - Son
Is this an adult or child's book? - Adult or Young Adult Book
Job/Profession/Status story Yes
Taboo sex story? Yes
Lover is - much younger/older

Main Character
Gender - Male
Profession/status: - teacher
Age: - 60's-90's
Eccentric/Mental Yes
Eccentric: - eccentric - deluded
Ethnicity/Nationality - Jewish
How sensitive is this character? - middling sensitive to others' feelings
Sense of humor - Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence - Smarter than most other characters
Physique - average physique

Main Adversary
Identity: - society

Setting
How much descriptions of surroundings? - 1 (None)
United States Yes
The US: - Northeast
City? Yes
City: - New York

Style
Person - mostly 1st
Accounts of torture and death? - generic/vague references to death/punishment
Sex in book? Yes
What kind of sex: - descript of kissing - touching of anatomy - licking - actual description of hetero sex - descript. of female anat. (the big B's) - descript. of nude males (the big P)
Amount of dialog - significantly more descript than dialog

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The Dying Animal Philip Roth Book Review

The Dying Animal
Philip Roth Book Review