Hey all.
Re: Sophie's Choice, I've still not finished (reading other stuff, too much time on the internet ), but I agree, to a certain extent, about your analysis. A bit disappointing.
There is an element of unreliable narrator/youthful narrator though, I suppose: Sophie is not the best or most reliable teller of her own tale/Stingo is looking back at the young idiot he was/the "deception" of Nathan: so perhaps some of the superficiality/stereotyping, etc. is meant to generate that impression. However, I think that - on the whole - if this is his strategy, it doesn't work very well (particularly since he frequently alludes to these ideas, so it's rather "in your face").
Agree that there are too many themes, or at least too many for him to manage successfully. Again, however, I wonder whether this isn't "deliberate", in the sense that the superfluity of themes mirrors the superfluity of horror - things moving out of control, etc.; plus, as a young editor at the beginning of the book, it is ironic that he can't "edit" his own tale, that it runs away from him, to a degree.
Have already implied that I found the Nathan/Sophie thing a bit soap-operaish.
Also, the Nathan as great predictor of things to come (e.g. success of Jewish American writers; invention of the tape WTF???!) is just a bit naff, IYSWIM. I dislike that kind of retrospective "prophecy" in fiction.
Anyway, I still need to finish in order to say more...
Nanny going ok, although DD still being resistant and a bit sad.