This wonderful novella is set in a familiar time and place for Philip Roth: Newark, NJ in the 1940s.  It is a meditation on life and how people deal with the terrible pain that life throws at them.  The book starts out in a Jewish neighborhood at a time when parents and siblings were agonizing about the fate of young men fighting in World War II.  A new scare starts to preoccupy them: polio.  Children are especially vulnerable, and can die or be left with permanent disabilities.  The story has the lead character of Bucky Cantor, director of the Chancellor Avenue playground, in charge of the activities of a group of young boys.  Bucky is 23 years old, and he was rejected from service in the armed services because he did not meet the physical requirements.  Yet he is extremely fit and strong.  Not only that, but he is courageous and reasonable.  The boys think of him as a hero.  The causes of polio where not understood, and so most people tend to look for a scapegoat to blame.  They blame a group of Italian youths and a hot dog stand when a popular 12-year-old boy comes down with polio and dies suddenly.  They can’t make sense of the awful tragedy, and they can’t live with that, so they have to make their own explanations.  Bucky is the only one who can live with the uncertainty, who does not rush to blame, and who emphasizes the need to be reasonable.  He may not be the brightest person around — his interests are limited mostly to athletics — but he is a paradigm of virtue.

However, the brilliance of the novel comes late in the story when some unfortunate events put Bucky under particular pressure, and he changes.  His character collapses, and he becomes a sad, tragic figure.  It’s a great study of moral change, and will be particularly interesting to philosophers immersed in virtue ethics.  The writing is engaging and the portrait of a particular moment where polio was such an important disease is fascinating. 

The reading of the novel by Dennis Boutsikaris in the unabridged audiobook is excellent, bringing the characters to life and giving a strong impression of a Jewish neighborhood without overdoing the accents.

© 2011 Christian Perring        

Christian Perring, Professor of Philosophy, Dowling College, New York