John Updike

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Introduction

John Updike, born in 1932, American novelist, short-story writer, poet, and critic. Updike is known for his well-crafted prose that explores the hidden tensions and problems of middle-class American life. His characters frequently experience personal turmoil and must respond to crises relating to religion, family obligations, and marital infidelity.

Life

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John Hoyer Updike was born in Shillington, Pennsylvania. After attending public schools he received a scholarship to attend Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Updike was editor of the Harvard Lampoon humor publication while a student there; he graduated in 1954 with a degree in English literature and spent a year studying at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art at Oxford University in England.

Updike returned to the United States in 1955 to accept his dream job, as a staff writer for The New Yorker magazine. He stayed just two years, however, deciding to leave New York City and move to a small town in Massachusetts to write fiction and poetry. It is this type of community, the suburbs and small to midsized towns, where Updike typically sets his fiction. His relationship with The New Yorker remained intact; many of his short stories, poems, and essays since that time were first published in the magazine. Updike was given the National Medal of Arts by President George H. W. Bush in 1989.

III

Works

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Updike began his literary career as a poet. His first book, The Carpentered Hen (1958), was a collection of verse. Later collections include Facing Nature (1985) and Americana (2001). Collected Poems: 1953-1993 appeared in 1993. Updike has also published numerous collections of short stories, of which Bech: A Book (1970), Trust Me (1987), and The Afterlife (1994) are typical in their precise observation of both social milieu and psychological states. Two more collections of stories about the Jewish writer Bech followed: Bech Is Back (1982) and Bech at Bay (1998).

Updike’s Novels

Updike’s major achievement is in the novel. His first novel, The Poorhouse Fair (1959), an allegory about life in an old people’s home, is in the anti-utopian tradition. The author uses the microcosm of the home to counterpoint various ideas about individualism, social reform, and the welfare state. The Centaur (1963) is ostensibly about a Pennsylvania schoolteacher and his adolescent son (Updike’s father was a teacher), but the novel has complex mythical overtones. The book won the 1964 National Book Award for fiction. Of the Farm (1965) is concerned with one of Updike’s favorite themes: husbands and wives—or, occasionally, parents and children—attempting to make sense of their lives within the context of each other. Couples (1968) is a study of godless suburbia, where sex displays its inadequacy as substitute fulfillment.

The Witches of Eastwick (1984) uses the supernatural as a metaphor for all-too-human folly in small-town contemporary New England. Its portrayal of three women who have magical powers over men drew sharp criticism for a supposed antifeminist stance. The book was made into a motion picture featuring Michelle Pfeiffer, Susan Sarandon, and Cher as the witches. Roger’s Version (1986) deals with religious faith and the problematic relation between science and religion. In the Beauty of the Lilies (1996) explores changing spiritual and ethical standards as influenced by scientific and industrial progress and the currents of history. Later novels include Gertrude and Claudius (2000), an ambitious reimagining of what led up to the events in William Shakespeare’s play Hamlet; Seek My Face (2002), a meditation on postwar American art by an older woman who was married to two prominent artists; Villages (2004), the main character’s recollections of the places and the women in his life; and Terrorist (2006), which scrutinizes the motives of a teenage Arab American terrorist.

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Introduction

Life

Works

Updike’s Novels