The attack on the farm which resulted in the rape of his daughter and her near immolation penetrates every part of his life, even in his work as he unconsciously writes the character of Byron's daughter Allegra in his opera. A character he hadn't planned to incorporate, Allegra's voice cries, "Why did you leave me?" Come get me! , strangely paralleling Nightmare-Lucy's voice, and he is therefore unable to ignore his grief any longer. In American Pastoral, the reader begins to criticize the Swede's strength, his fatal flaw being being too caring. An example of this is when Merry asks the Swede to kiss him as he kisses his mother and after an initial refusal, his father kisses him passionately on the mouth. This transgression is highlighted as a crucial factor debated in the Swede's mind as to whether it is the cause of the subsequent grief suffered, "he wondered if the strange parental faux pas was not a breakdown responsibility for which he paid for it for the rest of his life.” This becomes the center of his mental hell, in which he wonders how he could have "hurt" Merry. The consequences of the kiss cause the Swede to become more wary of his emotions and affection towards Merry. This solitary behavior adds to the Swede's fragmented state of mind. Both novels place great emphasis on their context and historical grief. Although American Pastoral was written in 1997, it is set in a 1960s America torn apart by domestic unrest resulting from the ongoing war in Vietnam. Significantly, although never directly mentioned in the novel, the American people's mourning for President Kennedy following his assassination is reflected in the role of the protagonist, Lou "the Swede" Levov. Roth biography...... middle of paper ......ie, only David Lurie reaches the final stage of grief in the Kübler-Ross model: acceptance. The Swede, on the other hand, is described as being "plagued by shame, uncertainty and pain for the rest of his life." David's recovery after "his enjoyment of life has been extinguished" and he feels "his interest in the world flowing out of him drop by drop", although not immediately disappearing, is granted salvation by the abandoning his old wrongs, reflecting Coetzee's view of post-apartheid South Africa. He loses his oppressive identities as a seducer, an absent father, and a self-centered person, all of which result in his abandoning his adopted dog to put him down in order to save him from further suffering. Thanks to him, he abandons his own suffering and can emerge from the mourning process without sinking into melancholy like the Swede.Big. Red. Happy.’