The Magic of Philip Roth

A review of Goodbye, Columbus.

It’s scary that Goodbye, Columbus was Philip Roth’s debut, scarier still that he published it at twenty-six. He wrote the novella at an age when all I was concerned with was the removal of lace. He was concerned about that too, but it didn’t derail him then—that came much later.

I have no insight into Roth’s process for this particular story, but if he f…