The Facts

p>How does a novelist write about the facts of his life after spending years fictionalising those facts with irrepressible daring and originality?br>br>What becomes of 'the facts' after they have been smelted down for art's sake? In i>The Facts -/i> Philip Roth's idiosyncratic autobiography - we find out. Focusing on five episodes in his life, Roth gives a portrait of his secure city childhood in Newark, through to his first marriage, clashes with the Jewish establishment over i>Goodbye, Columbus/i> and his writing of i>Portnoy's Complaint/i>. In true Rothian style, his fictional self Nathan Zuckerman is allowed the final, coruscating word of reply./p> p>How does a novelist write about the facts of his life after spending years fictionalising those facts with irrepressible daring and originality?br>br>What becomes of 'the facts' after they have been smelted down for art's sake? In i>The Facts -/i> Philip Roth's idiosyncratic autobiography - we find out. Focusing on five episodes in his life, Roth gives a portrait of his secure city childhood in Newark, through to his first marriage, clashes with the Jewish establishment over i>Goodbye, Columbus/i> and his writing of i>Portnoy's Complaint/i>. In true Rothian style, his fictional self Nathan Zuckerman is allowed the final, coruscating word of reply./p>