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John Updike
(4)John Updike would have been 77 today. I was never a fan. Updike wrote what I consider the essential New Yorker story from their William Shawn years and I sort of preferred some one like Truman Capote. Anyway, I thought Rabbit should just get over himself.
Of Updike the poet, The Poetry Foundation says:
An acclaimed and award-winning writer of fiction, essays, and reviews, John Updike has also been writing poetry for most of his life. . . . In an interview Updike stated, I began as a writer of light verse, and have tried to carry over into my serious or lyric verse something of the strictness and liveliness of the lesser form. In his teens, he was already publishing poems in magazines.
In many ways, I think he may always have been a writer of light verse.
You’ll find a selection of Updike poetry, including a podcast or two, at the Poetry Foundation.
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John Updike, poetry, The New Yorker, Truman Capote, William Shawn
4 Responses to “John Updike”
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I thought Rabbit should just get over himself.
In a word.
Well said!
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“Dalziel nodded wisely, winked and turned away….Behind him the conversation between Fielding and the Americans resumed.
‘I don’t care for Updike. Overwrought, overblown and overpraised,” cried Bergmann.
‘Yeah,’ drawled Flower. ‘Updike’s a shit.’….…’Mailer’s a shit……..Longfellow…well, Longfellow…well, Longfellow’s a shit also.”
_An April Shroud_, 1975 by Reginald Hill
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I really admired Updike’s descriptions of place, but I could never work up any interest in how Rabbit felt or what was going to happen to him next. Same as Hemingway and Cormac McCarthy…impressive prose, but for what?
I’ve never had that “Get over yourself” feeling about a woman prose stylist, although there are several that “everyone” admires but me. I can usually articulate my objections there. I don’t know what it means…guess I’ll go mull over the concept of Updike, Mailer, and Longfellow as….
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sherry March 18th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
Rebecca, now I’m trying to think of women writers I’d consider “prose stylists” and having trouble coming up with any. Annie Proulx maybe? Lee Smith?
Anyway, I agree with you about Hemingway and Cormac McCarthy: I think they’re both at base very sentimental.
And I take no responsibility for anything Poppysmatus says.
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