Word: counterbook
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Shortly before the publication of his novel The Counterlife (1987), Philip Roth remarked, "If I ever wrote an autobiography, I'd call it The Counterbook." Fat chance, or so it seemed at the time. For nearly 30 years, Roth had been hearing accusations that he was merely a closet biographer, that his heroes, whether named David Kepesh, Peter Tarnopol, Alexander Portnoy or Nathan Zuckerman, were simply transparent disguises for their self-obsessed creator. Finding that denials did nothing to stem such charges, Roth responded by heaping coals on controversy. Did some readers accuse him of anti-Semitism? Very well. Roth...
Having tirelessly ridiculed the notion that his books are really about himself, Roth has now produced -- an autobiography. It is not called The Counterbook, as it turns out, but The Facts, in which the previously reticent writer points out instances in which his life, after all, has been lugged directly into his fiction. No one who has carefully followed Roth's career could have expected this mid-life striptease, least of all, apparently, its author. His confession begins with an apologia of sorts, a letter to Zuckerman explaining how the book came to be written and wondering "Why should anybody...
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