Three years ago, the famed novelist’s legal team sent Zanisnik a cease and desist letter to stop his performance of Every Inch a Man, a show in which the artist silently read Roth’s The Great American Novel in a glass case while a fan blew “old baseball cards and money in the air around him.”
Roth retired a month after stopping the fantastically on-the-nose show, which wouldn’t have been out of place on Broad City or Inside Amy Schumer, but Zanisnik’s interest in the author has only increased. His next show, which premieres in Miami in December, “features hundreds of Roth novels embedded inside several ... installations.” The piece will also include a “Roth reading room, where visitors can explore the New Jersey native’s extensive oeuvre.” That is, if any visitor gets to see the show—Zanisnik expects another round of legal action.