American Pastoral

After five years, the Swede finally reunites with Merry, but her situation is worse than he ever imagined—she has been on the run all this time, has moved from state to state, survived being raped, and is now living in dangerous squalor back in Newark. Her search for moral clarity has led her to Jainism, a philosophy of non-violence toward all living things, which she follows to the point of self-starvation. The Swede’s stoicism and devotion to duty are tested like never before, as he struggles to remain calm and patient despite wanting to shake sense into his daughter and drag her back to the safety of home. Everything that has worked for the Swede thus far—his placid demeanor, his diplomacy, his insistence that everything is fine—suddenly fails him, and he is left wondering how a just universe (or God) could possibly punish him this way. To add insult to injury, Jerry, rather than consoling him, chooses his brother’s moment of pain and vulnerability to unload all his long-held criticisms on his older brother—he only loves Merry as a “thing,” his only priority is to maintain appearances, and he’s always been too eager for their father’s approval. The Swede has hit rock bottom, and Jerry, for good or ill, tries to shake him out of his complacency (jealousy may also be a part of Jerry’s motivation). Jerry is the ultimate cynic, unperturbed and uncaring about Merry’s sexual assaults. He and his brother are the inverse of one another, existing as narrative foils to push and pull each other toward a sensible middle ground.

In Merry’s new stoicism, Roth suggests that the search for moral clarity may be in the end a self-destructive impulse. While the Swede cannot abide his daughter’s actions, her rationale is lucid and coherent, her stutter completely gone. What speech therapists and “stuttering diaries” could not accomplish, her single-minded devotion to Jainism has. The moral ambiguity of the world—the way every safe and comfortable life involves a tacit acceptance of injustice, of safety and comfort denied to others—has always been intolerable to her. If she has seemed uncomfortable in her own skin, it reflected the profound moral discomfort that, for her, came with benefiting from an unjust social system. Now she has cut herself off from all those benefits, and her discomfort and diffidence have vanished along with her stutter. At the same time, she is on the run from the FBI and slowly starving to death, suggesting that her strategy for coping with the perceived moral bankruptcy of America is not a sound one.

The Swede, cocooned in his beloved old house in his cozy, predictable life, must confront not only his daughter’s physical and mental precariousness but also his own. If Merry, privileged, educated, and smart, is vulnerable to the madness of the outside world, aren’t we all? In this moment, the Swede has two choices: reckon with this terrifying reality or chalk it up to something (or someone) else. It’s Rita Cohen’s fault. It’s the war. It’s his inappropriate kiss. At the root of the Swede’s incomprehension is his unwillingness to face The Elusiveness of Identity. Jerry understands the insecurity of life and the peril of prioritizing appearances over reality. His admonitions to the Swede to wake up, to drag Merry out of her unsafe environment and back to the comforts of home, are a radical challenge to his brother’s safe and long-held identity. Perhaps if he can see how precarious and provisional the identities of those around him are— including those of Dawn and Bill and Jessie Orcutt—he can be compelled to finally take action. Roth asks deep questions, but he does so through the eyes of his protagonist. Merry’s asceticism allows Roth to push these metaphysical issues to the fore as the Swede wrestles with his own morality and the question of whether some lives are more valuable than others.

For the Swede, another component of The Elusiveness of Identity is the persistent question of The True Meaning of “American.” If the Swede’s oldest and most cherished goal is to become the ideal American, then his Jewish identity means that in some people’s eyes (including, at times, his own), he will always fall short. When the Orcutts, with lineage dating back to the American Revolution, come over for dinner, the Swede can’t help but compare his own roots to his neighbors’. Bill Orcutt can wander into the local cemetery and point out family connections dating back hundreds of years. As much as the Swede has tried to insinuate himself into the WASP (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant) community, he always feels like he has to try just a little harder. Those compensatory efforts show in the Swede’s adoration of his home (if his lineage can’t date back to the Revolution, at least his house can) and in his refusal to join Bucky Robinson’s temple community. He refers to his own religious and cultural heritage dismissively as “that stuff,” and that fear of inferiority is physically manifested in Dawn’s apparent affair with Orcutt. As long as the Swede equates success with proximity to an Anglo-Protestant ideal, there will always be others with whom he can’t quite compete.