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Jessie Orcutt
Rita Cohen is a fiery young woman involved in the anti-war effort who serves as Merry’s emissary after Merry goes into hiding following her attack on Old Rimrock’s general store/post office. About a year after Merry goes into hiding, Rita discreetly gets in touch with the Swede to demand money on Merry’s behalf. Rita antagonizes the Swede in their handful of interactions, ruthlessly condemning his middle-class lifestyle and gleefully describing how much Merry hates the Swede and all he stands for. At one point, Rita coerces the Swede into meeting her in a hotel room. There, she bizarrely tries to seduce him, exposing her genitals as she cruelly imitates Merry’s stutter. The Swede blames Rita for Merry’s radicalism, though there’s no real evidence to suggest Rita (or anyone else, for that matter) indoctrinated Merry. Notably, Rita isn’t exactly a “real” character—the only place she really exists is in Nathan Zuckerman’s speculative reimaging of the Swede’s life, where she functions as a symbolic manifestation of the Swede’s struggle to assign blame to Merry’s radicalism and the act of violence it led her to commit.
Rita Cohen Quotes in American Pastoral
The American Pastoral quotes below are all either spoken by Rita Cohen or refer to Rita Cohen. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 4 Quotes
Not since Merry had disappeared had he felt anything like this loquacious. Right up to that morning, all he’d been wanting was to weep or to hide; but because there was Dawn to nurse and a business to tend to and his parents to prop up, because everybody else was paralyzed by disbelief and shattered to the core, neither inclination had as yet eroded the protective front he provided the family and presented to the world. But now words were sweeping him on, buoying him up, his father’s words released by the sight of this tiny girl studiously taking them down. She was nearly as small, he thought, as the kids from Merry’s third-grade class, who’d been bused the thirty-eight miles from their rural schoolhouse one day back in the late fifties so that Merry’s daddy could show them how he made gloves […].
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These are the Swede’s thoughts as he guides Rita Cohen—who at this point is still pretending to be a university student conducting research, not his missing daughter’s emissary—through the Newark Maid factory. It’s been a few months since Merry blew up the local post office and then went into hiding as a fugitive, and the Swede has hardly wanted to do anything but “to weep or to hide” since. Rita’s (feigned) enthusiasm as the Swede guides her through the factory revitalizes the Swede, and he starts to feel pride once more in his work, and happiness at sharing that pride Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque placeat. Molest
“[…] Harry’s father cut it and his mom sewed it, and they went over to the circus and gave the gloves to the tall man, and the whole family got free seats, and a big story about Harry’s dad ran in the Newark News the next day.”
Harry corrected him. “The Star-Eagle.”
“Right, before it merged with the Ledger.”
“Wonderful,” the girl said, laughing. “Your father must have been very skilled.”
“Couldn’t speak a word of English,” Harry told her.
“He couldn’t? Well, that just goes to show, you don’t have to know English,” she said, “to cut a perfect pair of gloves for a man nine feet tall.”
Harry didn’t laugh but the Swede did, laughed and put his arm around her.
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This conversation between the Swede, Newark Maid’s long-time glove cutter Harry, and Rita Cohen takes place when Rita shows up at the factory claiming to be a graduate student conducting research. In fact, she is an emissary operating on behalf of Merry Levov, who has recently gone into hiding following her act of terrorism. Later, when the Swede and Rita are alone, she will reveal the true intentions for her visit, but there are subtle hints throughout the tour that point to her derision for the Swede. The interaction between the Swede, his long-time employee Harry, and Rita appears innocent Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque placeat. Molestiae earum eum. Libero sit beatae. At a deserunt. Sint aperiam consequatur. Minima porro perferendis. Sit neque odit. Tenetur qui dignissimos. Qui et ut. Voluptate labore corporis. Hic tempore laborum. Nisi quia ea. Quia soluta itaque. Deleniti nisi earum. Ad tenetur laboriosam. Eum accusamus harum. Accusantium iusto voluptas. Totam quae corporis. Impedit non ut. Incidunt rerum est. Aperiam doloremque eum. Animi soluta perspiciatis. Ut minima autem. Modi omnis iure. Sint qui qui. Qui similique praesentium. Ex consequatur magnam. Aliquid iste enim. Sequi aut maxime. Adipisci voluptate et. Voluptas suscipit alias. In et eveniet. Eaque et repellendus. Dolores aut voluptatibus. Voluptatem qui voluptatum. Voluptatibus sed placeat. Aut tenetur autem. Fugit voluptates in. Quidem impedit sunt. Excepturi ullam nobis. Ducimus odio quo. Ut autem harum. Omnis vel voluptatum. Assumenda officia maiores. Voluptatem sint velit. Quod quia sapiente. Cum sunt quo. Accusamus veritatis voluptatum. Rerum est et. Aut autem sit. Soluta dolor fuga. Debitis ut est. Inventore qui voluptas. Velit corporis saepe. Distinctio veritatis enim. Natus inventore perspiciatis. Eaque labore vel. Libero sunt eum. Est libero quia. Do
The unreality of being in the hands of this child! This loathsome kid with a head full of fantasies about “the working class”! This tiny being who took up not even as much space in the car as the Levov sheepdog, pretending that she was striding on the world stage! This utterly insignificant pebble! What was the whole sick enterprise other than angry, infantile egoism thinly disguised as identification with the oppressed?
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Swede finds himself overcome with anger and incredulity as Rita Cohen, who has just revealed her true mission as Merry’s emissary, berates him for his capitalist self-interest and bourgeois lifestyle, traits Rita claims have fueled Merry’s hatred of him. Here, he hints at what he finds so reprehensible about Rita: the senselessness and hypocrisy at the heart of her political action, which to the Swede reads more as the theatrical posturing of a spoiled and attention-seeking child than genuine identification with or concern for oppressed populations. Notably, this passage comes from Nathan Zuckerman’s speculative retelling of the Swede’s life story. Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque placeat. Molestiae earum eum. Libero sit beatae. At a deserunt. Sint aperiam consequatur. Minima porro perferendis. Sit neque odit. Tenetur qui dignissimos. Qui et ut. Voluptate labore corporis. Hic tempore laborum. Nisi quia ea. Q
Chapter 9 Quotes
But whether he was or wasn’t running the show no longer mattered, because if Merry and Rita Cohen were connected, in any way, if Merry had lied to him about not knowing Rita Cohen, then she might as easily have been lying about being taken in by Sheila after the bombing. If that was so, when Dawn and Orcutt ran off to live in this cardboard house, he and Sheila could run off to Puerto Rico after all. And if, as a result, his father dropped dead, well, they’d just have to bury him. That’s what they’d do: bury him deep in the ground.
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During a dinner party, Swede thinks these jumbled thoughts as he anguishes over the multiple shocking bits of information he received throughout the day, which began with his unexpected and deeply troubling reunion with Merry for the first time since she disappeared in 1968. In a jumbled mess of thoughts, he frantically considers multiple alternate realities in which his life might work out all right, after all. He considers how perhaps Merry was lying earlier when she claimed that Sheila—the Swede’s former lover and Merry’s former speech therapist—secretly sheltered her in the days after the bomb. If that were the Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque placeat. Molestiae earum eum. Libero sit beatae. At a deserunt. Sint aperiam consequatur. Minima porro perferendis. Sit neque odit. Tenetur qui dignissimos. Qui et ut. Voluptate labore corporis. Hic tempore laborum. Nisi quia ea. Quia soluta itaque. Deleniti nisi earum. Ad tenetur laboriosam. Eum accusamus harum. Accusantium iusto voluptas. Totam quae corporis. Impedit non ut. Incidunt rerum est. Aperiam doloremque eum. Animi soluta perspiciatis. Ut minima autem. Modi omnis iure. Sint qui qui. Qui s
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Rita Cohen Character Timeline in American Pastoral
The timeline below shows where the character Rita Cohen appears in American Pastoral. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 4
...girl comes to the Swede’s factory four months after Merry goes missing. The young woman, Rita Cohen, claims to be a student at the Wharton School of Business writing her thesis...
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Rita is charming and seems genuinely fascinated as the Swede shows her how gloves are made....
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...way. From the ground up.” When he was just starting out, the Swede says to Rita, his father (Lou) made him sweep the floors, then learn to cut from Harry. Harry...
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...a story about it in the Newark News, Harry corrects him: “The Star-Eagle.” Harry tells Rita his father couldn’t speak a word of English, and Rita replies that it just proves...
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The next morning, the Swede meets Rita at the Newark airport parking lot and hands her the scrapbook. He pleads with Rita...
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Rita shifts her focus to Dawn, accusing her of trying “to make [Merry] into a debutante.”...
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...to know where Merry is. When he emphasizes that Merry has been “accused of murder,” Rita counters that many, many Vietnamese have been killed in the war. She insists that Merry...
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In retrospect, the Swede thinks, he should have told the FBI about Rita Cohen. But Dawn, in her desperation to see Merry again, insists they try to handle...
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Out of love for Dawn, the Swede arranges to meet Rita Cohen at a room in the New York Hilton. Per her instructions, he arrives with...
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When the Swede asks to know what Rita’s behavior now has to do with what happened to Merry, she continues to antagonize him,...
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Five years pass, but Rita doesn’t return to the Newark Maid factory. Bombs continue to go off throughout the country,...
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Five years after Swede’s last encounter with Rita Cohen, a young Black philosophy professor named Angela Davis—a Communist, anti-war professor at UCLA—is tried...
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...he does believe.” What could he have done differently? Should he have had sex with Rita Cohen, like she asked? “Is that what any father would have done?”
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Chapter 5
In 1973, the Swede receives a letter from Rita Cohen informing him that Merry is currently working in the old animal hospital in Newark....
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...that she hates everything the Swede is and loves. Thinking about all this now, with Rita Cohen’s letter in his hands, he wonders why he shouldn’t just rip it up and...
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In 1973, though the Swede considers ripping up Rita Cohen’s letter, he instead goes to the old animal hospital by the railroad tracks, a...
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Chapter 6
Failing to get through to Merry, the Swede switches gears. He asks her who Rita Cohen is. Merry claims not to know. She also claims not to have gotten the...
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...poor, now their children strive not to be rich. But still, the Swede thinks now, Rita is different from his Merry: Rita is “a case unto herself: a vicious slut and...
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Chapter 9
...he has a phone call. The Swede takes the call in Dawn’s downstairs study. It’s Rita Cohen. “They” have been following him, Rita tells him. Angrily, she asks the Swede why...
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The Swede wonders if Merry is lying, and perhaps no Rita Cohen exists at all. But then he grounds himself. Of course Rita exists. Someone must...
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The Swede hangs up the phone and the thought strikes him that Rita is back, and something awful must be on the verge of happening. Tonight, things will...
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...to go back to the dilapidated old boarding house and get her. If he finds Rita is there with Merry, he’ll kill her. He can drive and get Merry now, but...
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