The Necessity of Anti-Semitism

The Jewish Question arises for Frederic Raphael in many forms. It is not, however, the only concern of the 50 essays and causeries collected in this work. As the title, with its allusion to Shelley, suggests, it is impossible to forget the past. How shall we make reasonable sense of a world that proves unreasonable time after time? The book shows how a humane secular society can retain its roots.

Born in 1931, Frederic Raphael was educated at Charterhouse and St John's College, Cambridge. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1964. The first of his numerous novels was published in 1956; his most recent, Coast to Coast, is published by Orion. He adapted The Glittering Prizes (1976) and After the War (1988) for television. He has written stories, biographies of Somerset Maugham and Byron, and screenplays, including the Academy Award-winning Darling (1965) and Far from the Madding Crowd (1967). He was the screenwriter for Stanley Kubrick's last film, Eyes Wide Shut.