Saul Bellow's Heart

'The greatest American author ever, in my view ... His sentences seem to weigh more than anyone else's. He is like a force of nature ... The people in Bellow's fiction are real people, yet the intensity of the gaze that he bathes them in ... opens up into the universal' Martin Amis'What Bellow had to tell us in his fiction was that it was worth it, being alive' Linda Grant'The backbone of twentieth-century American literature has been provided by two novelists - William Faulkner and Saul Bellow. Together they are the Melville, Hawthorne and Twain of the twentieth century' Philip RothGreg Bellow's bond with his famous-writer father was grounded in a tenderness, social optimism, and light-hearted humour rarely attributed to a man more often remembered for being quick to anger and schooled in rational argument. This intimate memoir gives voice both to the 'Young Saul' - the rebellious, irreverent and ambitious young writer, and dedicated father - and to the 'Old Saul', the writer known to the wider world, whose edges hardened as his social views turned pessimistic. The change taxed the relationship between Bellow and his son so sorely that Greg feared it might not survive. Saul Bellow's Heart is an affectionate, revealing portrait of a fiercely private man, a picture of a moving father-son relationship and a unique insight into one of America's greatest twentieth-century writers.

Saul Bellow’s Heart is a fascinating personal document written with much sympathy, yet an admirable candor, by Bellow's eldest son Gregory, a psychotherapist. It is a portrait of the artist at close quarters, and at a little distance; a confirmation of the deep autobiographical roots of Bellow's fiction; and a revelation of what it means to be the child, in this case one of three sons, of the most lavishly acclaimed American writer of the second half of the 20th century, A very personal, affectionate account of a giant of modern literature, Its family history can illuminate novels, [A] restrained and moving memoir, What distinguishes this ... is the ability to express both admiration and disapproval without becoming fully possessed by either ... The result, free from illusions and full of sweet writing, does greater justice to what his father left behind than any number of eulogies from his better-known literary sons

Gregory Bellow, PhD, was a psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapist for forty years and remains a member of the Core Faculty of The Sanville Institute. He lives in Redwood City, California.