Bench Pressing Tolstoy

Like a gopher defending its golf course, a novelist is naturally guarded when encountering an item titled The Novel, Who Needs It? I spent much of my reading-energy at war with this opinionated little book, and I am sorry to report that in the end, it won. Joseph Epstein, its distinguished author, has made a name for himself with his crackerjack prose, conservative common sense, and take-no-prisoners reviewing style. Whether we sympathize with his tastes or not, he has the power to communicate them. And yet he often rubs me the wrong way. His seething animus against Philip Roth seems excessively personal. Where the topic of sex is concerned, he fusses like Lady Bracknell, even if at times he is hilariously on the mark: “Don’t ask what Count Aleksey Vronsky would have requested of Anna if Philip Roth had written Anna Karenina.” Woody Allen good, that. Epstein is invariably quick to jab, and the kicking mood comes over him.