Philip Roth Studies

Arthur Koestler's Insight and Outlook (1949) and The Act of Creation (1964) clarify both the narrative technique of Roth's Indignation (2008) and Roth's career-long artistic antinomianism. Helpful in analyzing the delusory cognizance of Marcus Messner, the narrator of Indignation, are Koestler's ideas about "bisociation,"or the "synthesis between two fields, between hitherto unconnected aspects of the phenomenal world." Koestler's theories clarify the narrative complexity of Indignation, especially as that stands related to the subconscious association of ideas suggested by the poetics of language, whether experienced consciously or subconsciously. Moreover, Koestler's view of the "intellectual libertinage," of bisociative thinking—whether in dreams, day dreams, or in the unexpected poetical alignment of disparate contexts— provides a helpful way of conceptualizing Roth's provocative creativity and artistry.