The American author Philip Roth (born 1933) used his Jewish upbringing and his college days for the basis of many of his novels and other works. Roth used his experiences in growing up in the Weequahic section of Newark, New Jersey, and his days as a...

[This entry was updated by S. Lillian Kremer (Kansas State University) from her entry in DLB 173: American Novelists Since World War II, Fifth Series, pp. 202-234.] A major writer of twentieth-century American literature, Philip Roth has produced an...

In 1973, Philip Roth wrote a satirical novel about baseball which he entitled The Great American Novel. The title refers to the parodies of a number of classic American novels in the book, but it also may be an answer to critics who keep waiting for...

Literary awards are old news for Philip Roth, but his latest honor is truly special: The first ever PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction, a $40,000 prize named for the late Nobel laureate and one of Roth's closest friends and literary heroes."To my...

Philip Roth says he's done with Nathan Zuckerman. But is Nathan done with Philip Roth? "Goodbye, Nathan Zuckerman," the headline from Time magazine reads. Roth, the story declares, "has exhausted the possibilities of his character," the fictional adventurer of "The Ghost Writer," "The Anatomy Lesson"...

Barnes & Noble.com is getting a new look. Starting Monday, the online site for the superstore chain will have a thoroughly revised home page, including a running scroll of featured releases, and a number of new offerings, including Barnes & Noble Review, a magazine that...

Reviewing Cormac McCarthy's No Country for Old Men in today's New York Times, reviewer Michiko Kakutani laments that the novel's "lugubrious passages...gain ascendency as the book progresses." And Kakutani knows from ascendant lugubriousness. Six days earlier, the Pulitzer-winning critic labeled John Irving's latest work, Until...

In the following essay, Milowitz examines Roth's treatment of the Holocaust in such works as The Professor of Desire, The Prague Orgy, Deception, Operation Shylock, and others.

In the following essay, Royal argues that The Counterlife is Roth's most pivotal novel and marks the starting point for his exploration of a postmodern Jewish identity.

In the following essay, Greenberg examines the theme of transgression in Philip Roth's work, contending that the author's techniques are uniquely reflective of his relationship with mainstream American media and literary activity.