John Updike was born in
Shillington, a small town in eastern Pennsylvania, located in the vicinity of
Reading. As a teenager, he was fascinated by both writing and drawing. His
first ambition though, was to become a cartoonist and to work for Walt Disney
as an animator. But his life took a completely different turn later on.
Firstly, he graduated from The Shillington High School where he wrote regularly for the school paper The Chatterbox. Then, during his studies at Harvard, he was elected president of The Harvard Lampoon, a humor magazine. He also attended the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Arts in Oxford for a year. After his return to the United States in 1955, he joined the ranks of the New Yorker for only two years (and that is where his literary career is said to have started). In 1957 he moved to Massachusetts and wrote as a freelancer since then.
Firstly, he graduated from The Shillington High School where he wrote regularly for the school paper The Chatterbox. Then, during his studies at Harvard, he was elected president of The Harvard Lampoon, a humor magazine. He also attended the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Arts in Oxford for a year. After his return to the United States in 1955, he joined the ranks of the New Yorker for only two years (and that is where his literary career is said to have started). In 1957 he moved to Massachusetts and wrote as a freelancer since then.
Updike is best known for
the series of novels dedicated to Harry ‘Rabbit’ Angstrom, the former
basketball school star: Rabbit, Run
(1960), Rabbit Redoux (1971), Rabbit is Rich (1981), Rabbit at Rest (1990) and the sequel Rabbit, Remembered (2000). He also wrote
Couples (1968), a portrayal of the
first post-Puritan American generation, and The
Witches of Eastwick (1984) - a mock Gothic satire. The author embeds the
action of many of his novels in American ordinary small towns while his
characters are usually portrayed as average, middle-class Protestants. He
justifies this choice in the following way: "I like middles. It is in
middles that extremes clash, where ambiguity restlessly runs" (The Guardian). Updike depicts in his
novels the failure of the American dreams as well as the abandonment of the Christian
morality treated as the point of reference in the protagonists’ lives. In Terrorist (2006), in turn, he
scrutinizes the phenomenon of religious fundamentalism (Islam). Updike was not only
a novelist; he also published numerous poems, reviews, essays on art and
literature as well as short stories.
Updike is acknowledged worldwide
as one of the most talented American writers of the post-war period who won numerous
literary prizes. He received, for instance, the Pulitzer Prize (in 1982 for Rabbit is Rich and 1991 for Rabbit at Rest) and, in this way, he
went down in history as one of only three novelists (next to William Faulkner
and Booth Tarkington) who got this prize more than once. Updike was also
awarded the National Book Award in 1964 and 1982. In 1998, he received the
Medal of Distinguished Contribution to American Letters whereas in 2004 - the
PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. But the list is much longer…
by Marta MakoĊ
selected sources:
