John Updike

John Updike (1932–2009) was an American novelist, poet, and short-story writer whose work examined everyday life, sexuality, religion, and American middle-class culture. He is best known for the Rabbit novels and his decades of writing for The New Yorker.

Rabbit, Run: John Updike’s 1960 novel follows former high-school basketball star Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom as he abandons his family. This novel introduces Rabbit Angstrom, the protagonist whose life Updike followed across four novels.
Rabbit Is Rich: John Updike’s 1981 novel follows Harry Angstrom’s family and business life during the late 1970s. This third Rabbit novel won Updike the 1982 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
William Shawn: William Shawn was an American editor who led The New Yorker from 1952 to 1987. As editor, Shawn published and supported Updike’s work in the magazine.
Postmodern literature: Postmodern literature questions stable meaning and often uses formal experiment, metafiction, or fragmented narrative. Its self-conscious techniques contrast with Updike’s generally sustained, observational storytelling.
Suburban fiction: Suburban fiction portrays life in communities outside cities, often examining family, class, and social conformity. Updike made ordinary suburban settings subjects for serious literary attention.
The Witches of Eastwick: John Updike’s 1984 novel follows three women in a Rhode Island town who acquire supernatural powers. Its comic supernatural premise shows Updike working beyond the realistic mode of the Rabbit novels.
Rabbit at Rest: John Updike’s 1990 novel depicts Harry Angstrom’s later life and death in the late 1980s. The final Rabbit novel earned Updike a second Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
J. D. Salinger: J. D. Salinger was an American writer best known for the novel The Catcher in the Rye. Updike and Salinger were major postwar American writers associated with The New Yorker.
Southern Gothic: Southern Gothic is a literary mode that uses grotesque characters and unsettling settings to examine the American South. Its regional grotesquerie contrasts with Updike’s frequent focus on northeastern suburbs.
Adultery in literature: Adultery in literature is the depiction of extramarital sexual relationships and their personal or social consequences. Desire and infidelity repeatedly disrupt the marriages and households in Updike’s fiction.

Linked from 4 pages