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Yesterday I read Everyman. The novel's not long, maybe 180 small pages, and I wasn't doing anything exciting other than shopping at Costco and dodging a water balloon fight (despite my protestations of “I'm not playing! I'm not playing!��). The book intrigued me because 1) Mary, one of the local librarians, put it on her “recommended�� shelf (I mean for real, in the library, not on GR), 2) at least two of my friends hated it, and 3) I needed something short because I finished a novel Saturday and had another coming through the inter-library loan system early this week. I didn't hate Everyman. But I thought it was more yucky than good.

Okay, non sequitur I hope will make sense. Do you read Esquire magazine? I do. I'm not sure why. I think I read Esquire because the subscription costs five bucks a year. Anyway, Esquire provides hilariously weird and out of touch advice for men. The writers often try to talk all tough and knowing when they recommend which of three four hundred dollar shirts you must have in your closet. And how to order drinks in bars. And how to talk with kids about sex. And celebrity profiles in which male movie stars are held up as icons of masculinity. I don't know who these people are who follow Esquire's advice about shoes and women and money, but they're way more loaded than me and crazy insecure.

The guy in Everyman, I think, was into Esquire. That's fine. Knock yourself out. But Roth's primary sin is the implication, in my perception, that his characters are somehow representative of American males. Now, I guess I only know a couple 70 year olds, but I doubt many are so broken up about not getting a shot at young women that they try to pick up passing joggers. I also don't believe people talk with each other like the characters in Everyman. They go from zero to sixty on the philosophy scale in three inches of dialogue or less. The medical talk was probably the novel's most interesting element. The braindead bravado and self-pity got boring quickly. I resent the idea that Everyman is representative of, uh, every man. Or even most of them. Or a few. Most of us don't buy the belts and toys and advice recommended in Esquire. It's not that the ideas are all bad. We're just not from Esquire world. It's a goofy planet, somewhere in the same solar system as Everyman. Go at your own risk. I'll give Roth another shot, and I kind of remember liking American Pastoral, but I hope his other work is better.