The Perspectives Of Psychological Trauma And Suppressions Of American Jewishness In Philip Roth’s Human Stain And American Pastoral

Abstract

This study aims to examine empathetic trauma in terms of memory and morality. Coleman Silk in The Human Stain and Seymour Levov in American Pastoral are two examples of protagonists whose psychological repressions are studied. The characters written by Philip Roth in his novels are trauma survivors who carry the trauma with them, suppressed by an unknown power while they work with other trauma sufferers. American Jewishness is seen in American Pastoral and The Human Stain. The main protagonists in these books bring the Vietnam War to readers’ attention. In these books, Roth portrays post-war American society that was brought on by traumatic fear resulting from American involvement in Vietnam. It demonstrates how the novel deals with cultural trauma. Through the novel’s characters, the remembrance of historical atrocity is artistically depicted. Jews in America have long had distinct identities. Jews in America bear severe scars from the Holocaust. Numerous critics have examined the books from various angles. Still, this idea is to investigate the novels from the standpoint of how Vietnam War trauma is transferred from one individual to another. In reality, the protagonists’ psychological and physical anguish worsens in these works as a result of their horrific and weakly paralyzed experiences during the Vietnam War. So in this sense, when people want to flee their misery, traumatic events are prolonged.