Love in the Time of Polio: Sound, Sickness, and Stigma in Philip Roth's Nemesis

Philip Roth's novel Nemesis follows Jewish gym teacher Bucky Cantor as he unravels in the wake of a polio epidemic. Barred from fighting in WWII due to poor eyesight, Bucky attempts to atone for this self-perceived failure of masculinity by acting as a rational, masculine-coded voice quelling "hysterical" noise. However, Bucky's decision to leave his post catalyzes a crisis of identity when polio follows him in his retreat. As he draws closer to his "destiny" of self-imposed exile, I show how his attitudes about music, sound, and silence parallel his shifting sense of self. By denying himself the pleasure of listening to music he once loved-by embracing the silence of social alienation rather than the bustle of community engagement-Bucky becomes a character in a self-determined tragedy, destroying any chance for restitution in his life story.