Philip Roth's American Pastoral (1997) attacked home-grown resistance to the Vietnam war and featured a child of unparalleled wickedness named Merry Levov. I've now read I Married a Communist (1999) which ridicules the post-World War II political left and gives prominence to an even more horrible demon-daughter. This time it's Sylphid Pennington, an Iago-strength villain, who destroys her mother's marriage to Ira Ringold. She does so by forcing her mother to abort Ira's child, which, if it is born, she will "strangle in its crib." Roth's hatred of children is persistent, intransigent and obsessive. Has there been a writer since Thomas Kyd whose writings were so empty of love (except for self-love) and so focused on vengeance?
Moreover, what does Roth's prominence tell us about ourselves?
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