Prize-winning novelist Philip Roth has died at the age of 85. He identified himself as an American writer, not a Jewish one, but for Roth the American experience and the Jewish experience were often the same. A panel moderator berated him for his comic portrayals of Jews, asking Roth if he would have written the same books in Nazi Germany. With horror, she discovered his characters included a boring middle-aged wife named Claire, married to an adulterous writer named Philip. For years, he edited the Writers from the Other Europe series, in which authors from Eastern Europe received exposure to American readers; Milan Kundera was among the beneficiaries.

Source: The Irish Times May 23, 2018 05:48 UTC