tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7039707457010939097.post6104851399903773401..comments2024-01-18T04:42:47.809-06:00Comments on BitterGrace Notes: John Updike, 1932-2009BitterGracehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18262639525430954930noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7039707457010939097.post-11903333171796154422009-01-29T21:13:00.000-06:002009-01-29T21:13:00.000-06:00Notice how we're kind of dividing along gender lin...Notice how we're kind of dividing along gender lines here? I don't really share the widespread opinion that Updike was a misogynist, but there was an emotional detachment, a coldness, to the way he wrote about women that seems to turn most of us off.BitterGracehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18262639525430954930noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7039707457010939097.post-64548920089862504752009-01-29T20:20:00.000-06:002009-01-29T20:20:00.000-06:00I can always recall exactly the passage in The Wit...I can always recall exactly the passage in The Witches of Eastwick when Updike lost my confidence. I finished the book, but have been haunted by that ever since. And have not changed my mind, despite a couple of decades of reflection...ScentScelfhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12264276265890227820noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7039707457010939097.post-89103239532336826242009-01-28T20:12:00.000-06:002009-01-28T20:12:00.000-06:00I never felt like he wasn't writing for me, either...I never felt like he wasn't writing for me, either, but maybe I should try him again.Whodoohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12120455407514922099noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7039707457010939097.post-53063303948903152472009-01-28T18:56:00.000-06:002009-01-28T18:56:00.000-06:00I'd agree completely about Updike being a paleface...I'd agree completely about Updike being a paleface. The funny thing is that I like palefaces, in general. Who's paler than Edith Wharton? But I share your admiring alienation where Updike is concerned. I just always have the feeling that he's not writing for me.BitterGracehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18262639525430954930noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7039707457010939097.post-83431886217994472422009-01-28T15:43:00.000-06:002009-01-28T15:43:00.000-06:00I don't usually welcome any kind of bifurcation of...I don't usually welcome any kind of bifurcation of humanity, but I had a teacher once who used to quote Philip Rahv's division of poets into two groups: the palefaces (like Dickinson) and the redskins (like Whitman). Perhaps merely because that divide was introduced to me when I was first thinking seriously about literature, I often do see writers slipping easily into one camp or the other. And Updike, despite all the sex and the messy relationships, has always struck me as ultimately a paleface. <BR/><BR/>As someone temperamentally more attracted to redskin writers, I tend to admire Updike's almost incomparable accomplishments without actually enjoying much of it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7039707457010939097.post-21586742862176996112009-01-27T20:30:00.000-06:002009-01-27T20:30:00.000-06:00Oh, I'm sure I'm just missing the point with him, ...Oh, I'm sure I'm just missing the point with him, Bozo. I can be obtuse. I understand what you mean about the joyfulness, though--that's what I love in his art writing.BitterGracehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18262639525430954930noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7039707457010939097.post-29229637978706891552009-01-27T19:59:00.000-06:002009-01-27T19:59:00.000-06:00I'm a little surprised that someone might not alwa...I'm a little surprised that someone might not always have been a fan of John Updike. I have always thought of him as America's pre-eminent public intellectual, with a range so broad and a touch so light that I practically revered him. He had a scalpel-like mind and a vast breadth of learning and curiousity, yet everything he wrote had such a generosity of spirit that I cannot think of him without a smile. Learning is joyful, he seemed to say, and reading him certainly has been for me.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com