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>