Why Authorized Biographies Are Best
The Atlantic There’s value in knowing what the subject wanted told about himself. 6:30 AM ET Adam Maida / The Atlantic Ten years ago, at Philip Roth’s urging, his agent, Andrew Wylie, informed the literary critic and academic Ira Nadel “that he didn’t have permission to quote from Roth’s work, nor would any of Roth’s friends and associates cooperate in any way” with Nadel’s planned biography. When Nadel’s Philip Roth: A Counterlife came out in March, it received very few and generally indifferent reviews. The Wylie item comes from the other new Roth biography, the one that
Source: theatlantic.com