“I’m Just Jewish . . .”: Defining Jewish Identity in Philip Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories

Roth scholars are largely, and accurately, in agreement that in Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories (1959) Roth uses irony to satirize American Jewish middle-class anxiety about assimilating into the predominantly gentile American culture. This article explores the method by which Roth satirizes his Jewish characters. Specifically, the article demonstrates that, throughout the collection, Roth’s caustic attitude toward many of his characters is rooted in basic moral principles of the Jewish faith. Though Roth critics would certainly never label Roth a moralist, his first published collection of stories shows the writer to be critical of his Jewish characters via a moral paradigm.