In "The Anatomy Lesson"—Philip Roth's rich, satisfyingly complex conclusion to his Zuckerman trilogy, of which "The Ghost Writer" and "Zuckerman Unbound" formed the first two parts—the writer Nathan Zuckerman has a pain….

It is a pain that has forced Zuckerman to give up writing and spend most of his time lying on the floor in his apartment on a play mat….

Does Zuckerman learn anything from his mysterious ailment, as Tolstoy's Ivan Ilyich did from his? Do the cemetery and hospital settings of the final scenes of "The Anatomy Lesson" suggest that Zuckerman has come to terms with death and suffering like the protagonist in "The Death of Ivan Ilyich"? It's difficult to say.

Zuckerman is not Philip Roth of course; art is not to be confused with reality…. Moreover, there is a perceptible distance between the narrator of "The Anatomy Lesson" and its protagonist, most...