At 78, Roth says he hasn't written anything of substance in 3 years and that 2010's Nemesis will have been his last novel.  Oddly enough, I picked up Portnoy's Complaint recently for a reread.  It is still hilarious, risque and Freudian in all the right ways.  It still resonates as comedy and as a character study of the neurotic Alexander Portnoy who is consumed with both his lusts and his guilt over his lusts.

As I read it, I see all of the foreshadowing of Woody Allen's best films, particularly Annie Hall, Manhattan, Husbands and Wives and Deconstructing Harry.  Creators like Roth and Allen always find a way to remind me that our culture is somehow grander and more important than our politics and that the needs of the heart, loins and stomach deserve more attention and perhaps more leeway than our intellect will allow.

What's great about Portnoy's Complaint is that even in 2012 the language and subject matter still pushes ethical boundaries.  You could not read the book verbatim on broadcast television or basic cable.  I'm sure that in some parts of the country you could get in trouble for standing on a box and reading it out loud.

So, this post is my modest appreciation of Roth and an expression of gratitude he'll never see.  The Nobel Committee missed this one, but he deserved the prize.

UPDATE: Fantastic take by David Remnick.