The novella "Goodbye, Columbus," was first published in the 1959 collection, Goodbye, Columbus, and Five Short Stories, by Philip Roth, for which he received the National Book Award. Other stories in the collection include "The Conversion of the Jews," "Epstein," "Defender of the Faith," "You Can't Tell a Man by the Song he Sings," and "Eli, the Fanatic." "Goodbye, Columbus" was adapted to the screen in the 1969 movie by the same title, produced by Paramount, directed by Larry Peerce and starring Ali McGraw as Brenda Patimkin and Richard Benjamin as Neil Klugman.

Upon its publication, Goodbye, Columbus, and Five Short Stories received immediate and vehement condemnation by rabbis across the country, who considered Roth's portrayal of Jews and Judaism to be anti-Semitic, a viewpoint which they expressed in letters and sermons. As stated in the Gale Group's Contemporary Authors Online, it was to be "the first of...