Sabbath's Theater

At the age of sixty-four, Mickey Sabbath, a disgraced former puppeteer, remains defiantly antagonistic and insatiably libidinous, with sex serving as both his obsession and his guiding principle for perpetual misrule. His life is upended by the death of Drenka, his long-time mistress and a fellow erotic free spirit who shared his taste for the impermissible. Bereft and consumed by grief, Sabbath embarks on a tumultuous journey through his past, haunted by the ghosts of those who loved and loathed him. As he grapples with loss, memory, and the consequences of a lifetime of transgressions, he orchestrates a series of increasingly farcical and self-destructive acts. This descent pushes him to the brink of madness and existential crisis, forcing a reckoning with his own mortality and the scandalous legacy he has forged. Roth's National Book Award-winning novel is a raw, uncompromising exploration of desire, aging, and the human capacity for both profound connection and destructive self-sabotage.