I do agree, of Troy; although occasionally the storyline sags a bit for my taste, I am thoroughly enjoying Eugenides's language, characters and descriptions. Reminds me of Gabriel García Márquez's Hundred Years of Solitude.

About the narrator's claim that language is ill-suited to convey emotion because it is patriarchal, I would disagree, if only because I am really weary of the facile link that is established between anything male and lack or simplicity of feeling. Sure, this is not the character's claim (that males feel more simply), but I still object to the idea that it is some patriarchal influence that has given us those entirely unsatisfactory (for him) words to describe feeling. As of Troy remarks, no individual human experience can ever be like any other, and so one common language to describe both is necessarily going to fall short somewhere, however it has arrived at the shape it has (linguistic processes of change, simplification, economy, transfer, etc.)

And fortunately, more emotion-friendly "Germanic train-car constructions" can exist linguistically, cognitively and socially, as Eugenides proves with his own examples. No matter that we can't use a single word to describe "constant wonder at the uniqueness of each sunset"*: I am sure many of you can relate to a greater or lesser degree...

* and no, I don't think I would prefer one single word to describe it either!