NOVEL JEWS: Henry Roth Tribute
This month, the Novel Jews monthly reading series will host a special tribute to Henry Roth.
Henry Roth (1906-1995), author of the great immigrant novel “Call It Sleep,” was one of the giants of American literature. After completing his first book in 1934, Roth lapsed into a legendary six-decade silence. He re-emerged with “Mercy of a Rude Stream,” hailed as “a landmark of the American literary century” and “as provocative as anything in the chapters of St. Augustine.” The Novel Jews tribute to Roth will include readings by author and critic Daphne Merkin; novelist Steve Stern; Roth’s longtime editor, Robert Weil, and Roth’s son, Hugh Roth, who will read from his unpublished memoir about his parents.
Daphne Merkin is a novelist, essayist and former film critic for The New Yorker. She is a frequent contributor to The New York Times Book Review, The New York Times Magazine and a wide variety of other publications. She is the author of the novel “Enchantment.”
Steve Stern is the author of “The Wedding Jester” (winner of the National Jewish Book Award), “Lazar Malkin Enters Heaven” (winner of the Edward Lewis Wallant Award for Jewish American Fiction) and “Isaac and the Undertaker’s Daughter” (winner of a Pushcart Writer’s Choice Award and an O. Henry Prize). Stern’s new novel, “The Angel of Forgetfulness,” is a time-defying odyssey from the 1960s to the Lower East Side at the turn of the century, with a detour through heaven on the wings of a derelict angel.
Hugh Roth will read from “Egg Time in Augusta,” a memoir about growing up with unusual parents in unusual circumstances.
Robert Weil is vice president and executive editor of W.W. Norton.
What: Novel Jews monthly literary series presents a Henry Roth Tribute.
When: Wednesday, November 9, 7 p.m. – 9p.m., FREE!
Where: KGB Bar, 85 East 4th Street (between Second and Third Avenues), New York.
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