Monday, June 16, 2025

John Updike

 I find that knowing something of the writer's background is helpful for me in understanding their work. I should have been a historian, I tend towards categorizing writers not by personality but historical epoch. One thing wholly lacking in prison is information. The federal Bureau of Prisons is quite terrified of the internet, so no Google. This lack of information aids in infantilizing prisoners. This is part of a series of writers that I did look up when I got internet access. Some will be about the writer, and others may feature the writer. I went to YouTube for my main source, but others will also include some other material relating to the book or author discussed. One thing I did not have when younger was access to information about how writers wrote. I think that kept me from understanding the actual work, which, in turn, led me away from writing.

I am one of those who is not sure what to make of John Updike. Even when I was growing up, his was a name to conjure with. People knew he was a writer. I saw him at Clowes Hall back in the last century with Kurt Vonnegut. However, I did not read him until prison - things got in the way.

 The following video hits my problems with Updike, and then gives a couple of answers I needed to think about.


Man of letters seems so very apt. He was not out to throw bombs into the novel's form, or even it content.

His occupation with sex makes sense considering the times when he wrote Run Rabbit Run. For my generation, wife swapping was not a novelty. We may have understood it, there was a mystery related to the procedure, but we had had enough of Penthouse Forum and movies to get the idea.

Then, too, sex is the second great taboo in American culture. Until I got to read his novels, I thought Updike was a New Englander, a descendant of Hawthorne, for whom writing about sex was about breaking this taboo.

The number one American taboo is talking about money.

But, as this video says, and what complicates my opinion, is that he writes superbly.

I also came to read Ian McEwan, love him, but he thinks highly of Updike's writing, among other qualities.


Here is the man himself giving advice on writing and being a novelist:



In the end, it may be that my taste is off. I prefer Phillip Roth, another factory town kid, and John Irving, who is as conservative in his way as Updike (and has far more props recurring in his novels). From what I read of Updike, the Rabbit Angstrom novels are the only ones that stay in my mind.

sch 6/8

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