Indignation: A Novel

"Mesmerizing . . . Philip Roth's intrepid novel of self-revelation demands to be read in one sitting. It's that good. It's that audacious. It's that compelling." -The Seattle Times

"A magnificent display of writerly talent . . . Read Indignation-read it with an ear for the naked power of Philip Roth at full tilt." -New York Observer

"He is a master . . . Roth expertly and quickly builds up to a half-dozen final pages that absolutely deliver the kill." -Entertainment Weekly

In 1951, the second year of the Korean War, a studious, lawabiding, and intense youngster from Newark, New Jersey, Marcus Messner, begins his sophomore year on the pastoral, conservative campus of Ohio's Winesburg College. And why is he there and not at a local college in Newark where he originally enrolled? Because his father, the sturdy, hardworking neighborhood butcher, seems to have gone mad-mad with fear and apprehension of the dangers of adult life, the dangers of the world, the dangers he sees at every corner for his beloved boy. Far from Newark, Marcus has to find his way amid the customs and constrictions of another American world.