Philip Roth Studies

Meeting Philip Roth Jay L. Halio (bio) "You know more about me than my mother," Philip said, as I greeted him at Wilmington's train station. As acting director of Delaware's Jewish Studies program, I had invited him to our campus to give a talk or a reading in spring of 1993. We needed someone outstanding as a visiting speaker, and as I had recently completed my book about him and his work, who else could I think of but him? I took Philip to the Hilton Hotel, where we had lunch together and he had a room for the night. At lunch I found Philip very easy to talk to, and we enjoyed a few laughs together. All this came at a time when rumor had it that that he was having a nervous breakdown and going through a divorce from Claire Bloom after fifteen years of living together and three years of marriage. From all I could tell, Philip looked and sounded perfectly normal—not a hint of any psychological disorder (despite what Claire Bloom says in Leaving a Doll's House [1996]), so I did not bring up the subject. But I did ask him if the rumor was true about the divorce. He nodded to indicate it was, and I said I hoped it was an amicable divorce. He said it wasn't, and I immediately dropped the subject. That evening I could not persuade Philip to have dinner with me and a few colleagues before his presentation, though I suspect he might have had a bite on his own, either before or after the event. I was somewhat surprised that he chose to read from Patrimony, which had recently been published, instead of one of his novels or stories, but I was very glad he did. It is, of course, one of the best things he has written, and he read from it beautifully. When he agreed to answer questions from the audience after he spoke, he introduced an innovation. He asked that the audience write down their questions on slips of paper that were given out. I assumed naturally that he wanted to screen the questions, but he informed me later that this was a technique to prevent people from standing up and speaking endlessly before they got to their questions. The device worked very well, I have to admit, and after reading for about forty-five minutes, he began answering some of the questions he had selected. [End Page 59] One of the questions still stands out vividly in my mind. Someone asked, "When you write, do you think of yourself as an American writer or a Jewish writer?" His answer was what we should have expected. He said, "When I write, I ask myself what is wrong with this sentence, and how can I correct it?" What better answer could he—or any writer—give to the kind of question asked? Most of us know that Philip's books go through a number of revisions, often many, before he feels they are ready to see print. It is no wonder that stylistically as well as in other ways he is one of the best writers in America since World War II. I cannot recall many of the other questions, but one of them referred to a restaurant in New York that was a favorite of Philip's. Both he and the questioner enjoyed a good laugh about that, and I wish I could remember exactly what the question was and what occasioned the laughter. In any case, Philip was in excellent form and generously continued to answer questions for many minutes afterwards. We held a reception for Philip Roth later but advised those who came that it was not for signing books. Philip, who had been on his feet for about two hours, was understandably reluctant to stay long, disappointing the president of our University and others. The next morning I drove him to the airport, but before I let him out of the car, I did ask him to sign a few of his books I brought along. After all, how could I resist such an opportunity? I included the...