Saul Bellows Heart A Sons Memoir

In this warm, affectionate, yet strikingly honest look inside the life of one of America's greatest 20th century writers, his father the Nobel Prize-winning author Saul Bellow, Greg Bellow offers a view no one else has of a man known to be quick to anger, prone to argument, politically conservative, and palpably vulnerable to criticism. Yet there was a bond of tender emotion between Saul Bellow and Greg, his firstborn. In Saul Bellow's Heart, Greg Bellow gives voice to a side of Saul unknown to most others, the "Young Saul"-emotionally accessible, often soft, with a set of egalitarian social values and the ability to laugh at the world's folly and himself; rebellious, irreverent, and ambitious.Saul's accessibility and lightheartedness waned as he aged, and his social views hardened.This is the "Old Saul" most known to the world, and these changes taxed the relationship between Bellow and his son so sorely that Greg often worried whether it would survive. But theirs were differences of mind, not of heart.Interweaving stories based on autobiographical references in Saul's books that only he might recognize, Greg Bellow reveals himself to be a fine prose stylist, never shying away from the truth. In Saul Bellow's Heart, he has written a memoir that gives equal weight to the rebellious, irreverent, and ambitious young writer who raised him, and the older literary giant, famous and fiercely private.

"Saul Bellow was an incandescent being, and also incandescently difficult. Greg Bellow has written a wrenchingly candid account of being his son -- a real son, not a literary son: there is no self-invention here, there is only self-discovery. I was deeply moved by Greg Bellow's memoir of his passage from pain to acceptance. Amid the brutalities of love he has found its blessing." -- Leon Wieseltier

"Bellow scholars will be arguing about Saul Bellow's Heart for three hundred years." -- Gloria Cronin, Editor, Saul Bellow Journal "Saul Bellow was an incandescent being, and also incandescently difficult. Greg Bellow has written a wrenchingly candid account of being his son -- a real son, not a literary son: there is no self-invention here, there is only self-discovery. I was deeply moved by Greg Bellow's memoir of his passage from pain to acceptance. Amid the brutalities of love he has found its blessing." -- Leon Wieseltier

"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 a child, in this case one of three sons, of the most lavishly acclaimed American writer of the second half of the 20th century." —Joyce Carol Oates "Bellow scholars will be arguing about Saul Bellow's Heart for three hundred years." —Gloria Cronin, Editor, Saul Bellow Journal "Saul Bellow was an incandescent being, and also incandescently difficult. Greg Bellow has written a wrenchingly candid account of being his son -- a real son, not a literary son: there is no self-invention here, there is only self-discovery. I was deeply moved by Greg Bellow's memoir of his passage from pain to acceptance. Amid the brutalities of love he has found its blessing." —Leon Wieseltier “[A] richly personal portrait…Replete with compelling inside-literature tales, this is a loving and exacting remembrance of a ‘literary lion.” —Booklist “Bittersweet . . . Replete with intimate anecdotes and insightful glimpses into the autobiographical aspects of the elder Bellows fiction.” —Library Journal

In this warm, affectionate, yet strikingly honest memoir, Greg Bellow offers a unique look inside the life of his father, one of Americas greatest twentieth-century writers. Saul Bellow, the famous but fiercely private Nobel Prize winner, was known to be quick to anger and prone to argument, but he shared a tender bond with Greg, his firstborn.

In Saul Bellows Heart, Greg gives voice to a side of Saul unknown to most, the “young Saul”—emotionally accessible, often soft, with a set of egalitarian social values and the ability to laugh at the worlds folly and at himself. Sauls accessibility and lightheartedness waned as he aged, and his social views hardened. This is the “old Saul” most well known to the world, and these changes taxed the relationship between Bellow and his son, now an adult, so sorely that Greg often worried that it wouldnt survive. But theirs were differences of mind, not of the heart.

Interweaving memories, personal stories, and autobiographical references in Sauls books on which he can shed a unique light, Greg Bellow reveals himself to be a fine prose stylist and never shies away from the truth about his father.

In this warm, affectionate, yet strikingly honest look inside the life of one of America's greatest 20th century writers, his father the Nobel Prize-winning author Saul Bellow, Greg Bellow offers a view no one else has of a man known to be quick to anger, prone to argument, politically conservative, and palpably vulnerable to criticism. Yet there was a bond of tender emotion between Saul Bellow and Greg, his firstborn.

In Saul Bellow's Heart, Greg Bellow gives voice to a side of Saul unknown to most others, the "Young Saul"-emotionally accessible, often soft, with a set of egalitarian social values and the ability to laugh at the world's folly and himself; rebellious, irreverent, and ambitious.Saul's accessibility and lightheartedness waned as he aged, and his social views hardened.This is the "Old Saul" most known to the world, and these changes taxed the relationship between Bellow and his son so sorely that Greg often worried whether it would survive. But theirs were differences of mind, not of heart.Interweaving stories based on autobiographical references in Saul's books that only he might recognize, Greg Bellow reveals himself to be a fine prose stylist, never shying away from the truth. In Saul Bellow's Heart, he has written a memoir that gives equal weight to the rebellious, irreverent, and ambitious young writer who raised him, and the older literary giant, famous and fiercely private.

A revealing, very human portrait of a literary icon who hid behind stories, jokes, metaphors, and partial truths, never letting the public see his true self.

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.