In contrast with the fearful disease-ridden ghetto of Weequahic, Camp Indian is an American Eden with woods and lake and good clean American fun, allowing Roth the odd comic moment. But Bucky carries his guilt at abandoning the playground, and a fear that he has brought polio into Paradise, PA. Whether he has or not, polio arrives, and Bucky is one of the casualties. He ends up with a withered arm and a leg in irons — and profound guilt. "I wanted to help kids and make them strong and instead I did them irrevocable harm."

Bucky blames God and turn his back on the world, and especially on the loving Marcia. It is a quarter of a century before he begins to talk about the 1944 plague and then only to a fellow survivor.

He sees his plight as nemesis, apt reward for his failings. But he is wrong. More properly, his situation is governed by Nemesis's sister, Tyche, who dispenses random fortune. Although he sees himself as strong, self-sacrificing and ready to accept the consequences of his actions, Bucky is actually on a monumental ego trip.

The truth is that physical disability, of whatever cause, is a challenge and an opportunity, both for the sufferer and for the people with whom he comes in contact. It provides boundless possibilities for loving kindness, as well as challenging the disabled person to face the world positively. 

That may be easier for me to say than for fictional Bucky. I had polio in India just before my third birthday in 1955, and was more damaged, physically, than Bucky. I can't remember life pre-polio, and my parents worked hard to make sure that I had an optimistic outlook and a "normal" childhood and education. I was encouraged to think of myself being as good as anyone else.

Actually I was (and, friends might say, remain) as bad as anyone else, self-indulgent, lazy and headstrong. In mid-life, I became mildly workaholic and built up a successful publishing business, the sort of initiative common among polio survivors. But it is not will-power that has got me through: it is the abundant kindness of total strangers, the love of my parents and sisters, my friends, above all my wife Fiona and our children, that has helped me to live my life as God intended. It is not easy for them: I never really felt disabled until the birth of our first son, when I was confronted with my inability to carry him more than a few feet. It is Fiona who has done all the heavy lifting and asked for nothing more than a kiss.

Philip Roth does not convince me that Bucky's conscience would force him to deny such love.