Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Bellow, Saul (Vol. 200) - Karl Miller (review date 22 August 1997)

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Karl Miller (review date 22 August 1997)

SOURCE: Miller, Karl. “Jay Wustrin's Remains.” Times Literary Supplement (22 August 1997): 23.

[In the following review, Miller discusses the characters in The Actual as typical Bellovian characters and views Bellow as a lyrical and romantic author.]

A very astute, very old Jewish trillionaire is counselled here [in The Actual] by an astute Jew, no longer young, no longer poor, who has resumed relations with a first, never forgotten love. For Harry Trellman, a businessman, an importer, Amy Wustrin is “the actual”. “Other women were apparitions” for this narrator. “She, and only she, was no apparition.” This is the centre of things in Saul Bellow's latest work of fiction. Not that there are all that many things for it to be the centre of. It is a short book—no different in kind from one of his long stories—and an oblique one. Are we to suppose, romantically, that...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. John L. Brown (review date winter 1995)
   2. Sanford Pinsker (essay date spring 1995)
   3. Richard K. Cross (review date spring 1995)
   4. Jerrald Ranta (essay date fall 1995)
   5. Ethan Goffman (essay date winter 1997)
   6. James W. Tuttleton (review date June 1997)
   7. James Wood (review date 16 June 1997)
   8. Alfred Kazin (review date 26 June 1997)
   9. Philip Hensher (review date 9 August 1997)
   10. Karl Miller (review date 22 August 1997)
   11. Marvin J. LaHood (review date winter 1998)
   12. Faye Kuzma (essay date summer 1998)
   13. Martin Corner (essay date spring 2000)
   14. Penelope Fitzgerald (review date 15 April 2000)
   15. Jonathan Yardley (review date 9-15 April 2000)
   16. Jonathan Levi (review date 23 April 2000)
   17. Christopher Hitchens (review date 27 April 2000)
   18. Louis Menand (review date 25 May 2000)
   19. John Leonard (review date 29 May 2000)
   20. Adam Feldman (review date fall 2000)
   21. Adam Phillips (review date fall 2000)
   22. Rita D. Jacobs (review date autumn 2000)
   23. Igor Webb (essay date spring 2001)
   24. Bharat Tandon (review date 21 April 2001)
   25. Diana Hendry (review date 8 December 2001)
   26. Stephen Amidon (review date 10 December 2001)
   27. Gloria L. Cronin (essay date 2001)
   28. Morris Dickstein (review date 18 January 2002)
   29. John L. Brown (review date spring 2002)
   30. David K. Nichols (essay date winter 2003)
   31. Michael Davis (essay date winter 2003)
   32. Algis Valiunas (essay date September 2003)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright

1. Saul Bellow