The Roth family decides to flee to Canada

The Roth family decides to flee to Canada after fear of persecution makes life in Newark feel impossible to sustain. The decision marks a reversal for Herman Roth, who acknowledges that Bess Roth and the Tirschwells had judged the danger more clearly, and turns the family’s political anxiety into plans to leave their home and become foreigners.

The crisis behind the decision

The decision follows a night of gunfire near the family’s home. By morning, they learn that the shootout had been between city police and Jewish police, not an anti-Jewish mob and the police. Although there had been no pogrom, the violence came amid growing fear and emboldened antisemitism. The distinction offered little reassurance: the family had to reckon not only with what had happened, but with the possibility that worse persecution might follow.

At seven that morning, Herman calls Shepsie Tirschwell in Winnipeg. He concedes that he had been wrong and that Bess and the Tirschwells had been right. The admission reflects how deeply the night has unsettled him: a practical man accustomed to containing uncertainty can no longer preserve his composure in the face of not knowing what will happen next. He also recognizes that the family’s previous way of life has become untenable, despite the fact that no Jewish family in Newark had yet been forced to endure more than relocation.

From fear to emigration plans

Herman and Shepsie’s conversation turns to emigration, the steps involved, and the arrangements to be made. By the time Sandy Roth and Philip Roth leave the house, the decision is settled: the family has been overwhelmed by the forces around it and is preparing to flee. The call connects their immediate fear in Newark to a practical destination through Shepsie, who is in Winnipeg, and gives the family’s departure a concrete shape.

The decision also reverses Herman’s earlier certainty. He admits not only that he misjudged the danger, but that he mishandled the situation. The violence has broken through the rigid self-control that had long separated his harsh upbringing from the ideals he had formed as an adult. Emigration becomes both a response to an external threat and an acknowledgment that reason and everyday routine can no longer shield the family from political uncertainty.

The cost of departure

For Philip, the plans make the loss immediate. He weeps on the way to school, understanding that the family is about to leave and that his childhood in America has ended. The decision makes his homeland seem likely to become only the place where he was born; even Seldon Wishnow, already in Kentucky, appears better off by comparison.

The later end of the crisis does not restore the security the family once knew. Lindbergh is gone and the family is safe, but Philip cannot recover the uncomplicated confidence he had felt as a child protected by the republic and by his parents. The contemplated flight therefore remains consequential even after the threat passes: fear has already turned home into a place the family was prepared to abandon, and has permanently altered Philip’s sense of safety.