Tragic Innocence in Philip Roth’s American Pastoral

Gabriela Glăvan

doi:10.2478/v10319-012-0023-x

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Tragic Innocence in Philip Roth’s American Pastoral

Romanian Journal of English Studies

Volume 9 (2012): Issue 1 (December 2012)

By: Gabriela Glăvan

Open Access

|Feb 2013

Abstract

American Pastoral is not only an elegiac fictional biography, but an in-depth analysis of the demise of the American dream in the context of post-war social and cultural mutations. The loss of innocence echoes the tragic mythical Fall from Paradise and the novel’s main characters, Seymour “Swede” Levov and his daughter, Merry, mirror this process in a complex and meaningful way.

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