Philip Roth Goes Home Again
Philip Roth, a prize-winning novelist and frequent Esquire contributor, died Tuesday night at the age of 85. In 2010, on the occasion of his thirty-first book, Esquire's Scott Raab returned to the Newark of Roth's boyhood. And there, on Philip Roth Plaza, he couldn't stop laughing.
Scott Raab
May 22, 2018
This story first appeared in the October 2010 edition of Esquire.
There are worse places to be stuck in traffic than midtown Manhattan, worse people to be stuck with than Philip Roth. It's pretty nice, actually: Esquire hired a car to schlep us to New Jersey, Roth's old Jewing grounds, a jet-black SUV with a name — Tahoe? Denali? HinduKush? — and backseat as big as all outdoors, icy air-conditioning, and a small man at the steering wheel.
