Herzog

By: Saul Bellow

Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner

Length: 15 hrs and 36 mins

Publisher's summary

Winner of the National Book Award when it was first published in 1964, Herzog traces five days in the life of a failed academic whose wife has recently left him for his best friend. Through the device of letter writing, Herzog movingly portrays both the internal life of its eponymous hero and the complexity of modern consciousness.

Like the protagonists of most of Bellow's novels - Dangling Man, The Victim, Seize the Day, Henderson the Rain King, etc. - Herzog is a man seeking balance, trying to regain a foothold on his life. Thrown out of his ex-wife's house, he retreats to his abandoned home in Ludeyville, a remote village in the Berkshire mountains to which Herzog had previously moved his wife and friends. Here amid the dust and vermin of the disused house, Herzog begins scribbling letters to family, friends, lovers, colleagues, enemies, dead philosophers, ex- Presidents - anyone with whom he feels compelled to set the record straight. The letters, we learn, are never sent. They are a means to cure himself of the immense psychic strain of his failed second marriage, a method by which he can recognize truths that will free him to love others and to learn to abide with the knowledge of death. In order to do so he must confront the fact that he has been a bad husband, a loving but poor father, an ungrateful child, a distant brother, an egoist to friends, and an apathetic citizen.

Herzog is primarily a novel of redemption. For all of its innovative techniques and brilliant comedy, it tells one of the oldest of stories. Like The Divine Comedy or the dark night of the soul of St. John of the Cross, it progresses from darkness to light, from ignorance to enlightenment. Today it is still considered one of the greatest literary expressions of postwar America.

©1992 Saul Bellow (P)2009 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

"A masterpiece." (New York Times Book Review)

"Herzog has the range, depth, intensity, verbal brilliance, and imaginative fullness - the mind and heart - which we may expect only of a novel that is unmistakably destined to last." (Newsweek)

Grows Within You

As I rolled through this listen I kept waiting for for the profundity to hit. Surely there must some great, self-shaking thought just around the corner or maybe somewhere in Chicago. But everyday seemingly regular people, especially our mildly eccentric hero, never do anything really unexpected or extraordinary. Then it begins to sink in. This isn't about the extraordinary. It really is about the common, ordinary life of one man struggling with things we [all] struggle with.

The writing is like yeast added to water and that to flour. At first you don't really notice anything. But given time, it begins to grow. The thoughts on relationships are sad and funny at the same time. Why do we make bad choices? We just do.

I would add this book to a "must read" list.

The narration is perfect for the material and not overdone in the least.

Highly recommend if you like books above the level of the trashy novel but want something easier than Dickens!

Chris Reich
TeachU

Stuck in Your Head

Any additional comments?

I spend a lot of time arguing that you can get as much from an audiobook as from a paper book, but Bellow tests that claim. This is a powerful book about a man who has a hard time pulling himself out of the texts of his life and into his real life. It's slow -- slow in the sense that not that many things happen -- but it's also raging in the way we're in and out of Herzog's mind. His imaginary letters (some real) show him trying to get traction in the real world as he flees to the world of writing.

As a result, it's sometimes hard to listen to a novel that's so much about the business of writing. I often wanted to stop and re-read a sentence -- Bellow is a master of the sentence -- and I missed a sense of the textual nature of Herzog's various letters. Hillgartner can signal that we're into a new letter, but I don't think he can get across the effect of seeing the heading and recognizing the deterioration or recovery of Herzog's mind. And that's a crucial distinction because I think there are ways in which Herzog's mind (as caught in the text) is a different character from Herzog himself (as caught in his own story).

Best read audiobook I've ever heard

The narrator is outstanding, simply remarkable in a text that uses a variety of languages.

Not my favorite Bellow

In some ways Herzog is like many of Bellow's protagonists, yet I found Herzog less interesting (as I did the protagonist in The Dangling Man). Herzog is more philosophical and less active. There was some humor but most didn't resonate with me. I preferred The Adventures of Augie March, Henderson the Rain King, and Ravelstein.

The narration was fine, but did not add much.

Whiny as hell. When will the whining stop. Never

This is an extremely whiny book. I think it's perfect for dudes that like to feel sorry for themselves. Won a Nobel Prize! Ha! This is Terrible!

There is nothing respectable about Moses Hezog. He has a sedentary job, sloppy life, clucked, and does not raise his kids. Dude even has a therapist. Weak. Sad. Whiny.

But the real problem is that the story is terrible. It's boring. It's obsessive.

But there is an audience for this stuff. If you are An-Army-of-One and solve your own problems, don't read this book. This is a book for the other people.

Rambling and pointless

Holy hell. My wife recommended this book to me, in what I can only assume was some cruel practical joke.

I listened for an hour and NOTHING AT ALL had happened.

I'll return to it again because my wife wants me to read it, but for all of you out there who have free will, run for the hills.

I'll update my review if I ever hate myself enough to finish the book.

Forgettable

The lead character is self destructive & neurotic.
An unpleasant story about an unloveable character.

Not everyone should be the subject of a book

There must be a sub textual level to this novel that I just missed. Taking it at face value, I found it a boring account of an uninteresting person. Sure, Herzog has trouble with life and love, but who doesn't? He's a well-educated, middle-class guy with two ex-wives, a kid he's not as close to as he'd like to be, and many girlfriends. I just found him and his plight quotidian. I forced myself to finish this. While I didn't think Seize the Day and Henderson the Rain King -- the only other Bellow works I've read -- were masterpieces, I thought they were good reads. This one left me scratching my head as to why it's so highly acclaimed.

Dull dull dull

So I really tried.....I got through about 5 hours but I just couldn't continue - nothing happens

I liked the idea of a main character who spends most of his time writing letters, the style and narration are good but don't say you were not warned. It is so incredibly dull.

Midlife crisis

Struggled to finish; midlife crisis on both sides. Surprise revelation, but relevant? not so sure....

Read it for a book club, don't understand thd choice......