A Private Non-Commercial Academic Literary Website
The materials on this webpage and its section links are copyrighted for literary non-commercial uses only. No other uses of its contents are permitted.
The Centaurian Website was created online 15 November 1996
Our 12th Year Online
A JOHN UPDIKE WEBSITE FOR INFORMATION AND DISCUSSION
The 500,000th Website "Hit" Was Recorded Thursday, 22 February 2007
Last update 25 August 2008
Updike Reviews Basten's Max Factor in the September 1st New Yorker
Go to What's New in Updikiana: Information and Resources
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Now Kirkus Reviews and John Keenan in the UK Guardian
Booklist and Publisher's Weekly Preview Updike's Latest Novel
The Widows of Eastwick
Click and go to Chiron's Forum: Selected Essays and Criticism
ABC Brewing 'Witches of Eastwick'
To read these items click here and go to What's New in Updikiana: Information and Resources
**Scroll Down to the BULLETIN BOARD Below on this Opening Page for Current Topics, Issues of Timely Interest, and Fresh News Items**
Many questions you may bring to this page are answered in the eleven large sections listed here, including an extensive bibliography. Please visit those section sites before you write since you may find your answer already provided there.
Some suggestions: For most users here, both students and general readers, A Brief Biographical and Literary Chronology would be a good place to start. Those looking for bibliographical information about Mr. Updike's work and/or responses of his critics will likely want to visit A Cumulative Updike Publications Bibliography 1997-2006 and A Selected Bibliography of Updike Interpretation .
Click any of the underlined content items above or in the list below to access each separate section.
Updike in Portuguese: Brazilian Resources and Commentary = Updike em Português: Fontes e Comentários Brasileiros
Send your information, questions, and comments about the contents of this website by clicking the following Email link. You are requested to identify yourself by name and, for page records, to indicate your city and/or state, and country of origin. No information is ever passed along to other parties and no material is ever posted on the website without personal permission. We attempt to answer all correspondence within 24 hours.
About This Website . . .
John Hoyer Updike
WELCOME!
This website is designed to provide information and promote discussion about writer John Updike's life and work. As employed in his third novel, published in 1963, the Greek mythological figure of the Centaur--half human and half horse--clearly represents the ambiguity of human existence. It symbolizes both the soaring energies of spiritual transcendence which provoke anxiety and hope, and the captive energies of physical embodiment which generate suffering and pleasure. In all his writings John Updike has never failed to address the agonies and the ecstasies these tangled energies generate in human life. The Centaurian seems therefore an especially appropriate title for this site. It captures the focus of Updike's work in every genre. And, happily, he continues to write. For a rich variety of information concerning John Updike's life and work, past and present, check this website's linked content resources which immediately follow.
Special thanks are owed to David Lull, Senior Bibliographic Associate, and Larry Randen, Senior Literary Associate, for their indefatigable labors in keeping the news and information of this website both valuable and current.
James Yerkes, Ph.D., Webmaster and Editor
Write centaurian@prexar.com
"I miss only, and then only a little, in the late afternoon, the sudden white laughter that like heat lightning bursts in an atmosphere where souls are trying to serve the impossible. My father for all his mourning moved in the atmosphere of such laughter. He would have puzzled you. He puzzled me. His upper half was hidden from me, I knew best his legs."
The Centaur (1963): 269
BULLETIN BOARD
Updike on Turner: "Splendid Lies" in NYReview of Books
A CLASSIC!: "A FAN'S NOTES"
by Adam Gopnik
More Reviews of Updike's Jefferson Lecture
John Updike on American Art
"The writer brings a life of creative and critical labor to the examination of American masterworks"
By Jay Tolson
John Updike Explores How Art Mirrors America’s Soul
"Author examines artworks that illuminate U.S. culture, history, character"
By Lauren Monsen
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Is it "Liney" or is it "Painterly"? Is It "American" Art?
A Review of John Updike's Jefferson Lecture
By Larry C. Randen
Additionally, Randen is pursuing an inquiry into what exactly Edwards may have intended by the phrase, "The Clarity of Things." See the note preceding his article.
Go to What's New in Updikiana: Information and Resources
Listings of Upcoming Updike Appearances Are Welcome Here
JUST A NOTE HERE THAT WE ARE DEPENDENT ON OUR SITE READERS ALL ACROSS THE COUNTRY AND THE WORLD TO PROVIDE THE LECTURE AND APPEARANCE INFORMATION CARRIED ON THE CENTAURIAN WEBSITE. YOUR HELP IS CORDIALLY SOLICITED AS SPECIAL APPEARANCES ARE ANNOUNCED ACROSS THE COUNTRY.
When Mr. Updike travels to make appearances there is no central source of information available about these visits since he arranges his own schedule and prefers not to work through booking agents--though this is done from time to time. The same agent is not used in every case so information is impossible to gather unless persons in the area where he is to appear provide it for our use here under the site Item #5, Lecture and Appearance Schedule. This website is the only place where a public notice of scheduled appearances is posted. So, your help is cordially solicited in this somewhat daunting task. What is important is the date(s), city and state, time(s), site name location with room or hall, cost to the public (if any), and a contact telephone, fax, and/or email for the sponsoring party so interested persons may know how to solicit further information. As in all matters on this website, many thanks for the scores of persons who so faithfully assist in this and many, many other ways.
Dr. James Yerkes
Click here and go to Lecture and Appearance Schedule
Click Here to Go Back to Content Links
26 April 1968 Issue 18 October 1982 Issue
A PERMANENT INVITATION
We warmly invite interested persons to contribute to the content of this page in two ways.
First, we invite questions and comments from both occasional browsers and regular users in the Grazing Among the Centaurs section. From the beginning we have received numerous inquiries from high school, college, and graduate students about where Updike or his critics discuss certain issues. And adult general readers frequently ask similar questions. Sometimes I am able to help, and sometimes I am not. I know that there is enormous Updike expertise out there in webland--and not only among academics, to be sure--so it is now time that we draw upon that. These questions now constitute the first section of Grazing, noted below as Updike Reader Questions and Commentary (1).
Further, I have been very impressed with the comments many page respondents voluntarily share about the nature and locus of their interest in the work of John Updike. Frequently I write back to ask for more information because I find their comments so engaging. Given these sorts of responses, it seems there is both interest and need for a discussion section such as this. This invitation divides into sections two and three of Grazing: First Updike Reader Commentary and Monthly Updike Reader Discussion.
To help get the dialogue started, I initially proposed that interested page visitors respond to a question about the occasion which first prompted them to begin reading Updike. That invitation is now a standing call. This question is the one which interests the most readers--especially general readers quite outside of academia. So, please, new readers to the page, send us your answer to that first question:
"What occasion first prompted you to begin reading John Updike, and why did you continue to read him?"
Just click First Updike Reader Commentary here or below (2).
Finally, we warmly invite you to join us in timely topics of discussion here on the website. The section, Grazing Among the Centaurs (3), is devoted to discussion topics which change each month.
THIS DISCUSSION SESSION IS RECESSED YEARLY DURING JULY AND AUGUST
DISCUSSION TOPICS IN 2006 WILL BE OCCASIONAL
Click here and go now to Monthly Updike Reader Discussion
For more information about how to participate in these sections, click this Grazing Among the Centaurs link.
Second, we invite you to help us locate information and resources about Updike in the What's New in Updikiana section. Here we are interested in recent and current information about such matters as Updike's scheduled appearances and articles about him in the public media. Anecdotes from and critical commentary about his public appearances are also welcome from those who attend. We are also interested in the published location of his articles, stories, poetry, and drawings, as well as reviews of this major works as they appear and new critical resources assessing his literary efforts. All of these materials will constitute an ongoing bibliographical source for all page users. Your help will be very much appreciated in collecting this data. For more information about how to participate, click this What's New in Updikiana link.
Send your information, questions, and comments about this webpage by clicking the following link:
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Additional Literary Links
A SPECIAL REMINDER ABOUT THE WONDERFUL MATERIALS AVAILABLE ON The New York Times Updike Website
A couple of years ago The New York Times revised its Updike website and included some excellent new resources. Most readers here know that, but in case new readers do not, let me remind you of this fine resource located at http://www.nytimes.com/books/00/11/19/specials/updike.html .
In addition to reviews of Updike's book which have appeared in The Times, along with some articles, there are two wonderful audio recording of Terri Gross interviewing him in September 1997 and March 1998, with segment content listings so one may choose topics which are discussed in the interviews.
There are also texts of interviews with Updike concerning his work from 1961-1988.
There are, additionally, the texts of the first chapter from the books Toward the End of Time, More Matter, and Gertrude and Claudius, with an excerpt from Bech at Bay, the major portion of "Bech Noir."
Finally there is an Updike AUDIO READING from Licks of Love. The notice reads, "Exclusively on The New York Times on the Web, John Updike reads from "Rabbit Remembered," a novella from his new book, Licks of Love, which revisits the characters Updike introduced in his four novels about Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom. Recorded on Nov. 14, 2000. Duration: 43 min."
Be sure to visit that site from time to time to examine the new materials which appear there. It is a wonderful resource and the only extensive source online for texts from Updike writings, interviews, and reviews. [J. Yerkes, 9-1-01]
By all means check out the material available free and download-able free from The New York Times on the Web. The first link is the one I prefer, though the reviews of Updike's books go only through 1997. Click below for that page:
http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/04/06/lifetimes/updike.html
The second link here and noted above is organized differently but has more recent reviews. Click below for that page:
http://www.nytimes.com/books/00/11/19/specials/updike.html
A Brief Author Biography and Selected Bibliography
Mr. Petri Liukkonen is the librarian at Kuusankoski Library in Finland. Students will find this information very useful as a starting point in their Updike research. The Updike author website address is
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/updike.htm
http://www.libraries.psu.edu/crsweb/etext/updike/home.htm
Under the title "John Updike's Buchanan Dying," Penn State University Libraries provide a marvelous treasure of online manuscript and commentary resources. It is a rich resource and an example of the extraordinary research materials available through many university and special library systems. This is the only Updike site of which we are aware.
http://www.windhorst.org/updike/
Dr. Peter Windhorst put together a website, "An Updike Geography," with pictures of John Updike's residences and significant sites over the years, starting at the Shillington residence and extending to the house in Georgetown. Since Updike's home on Beverly Farms, MA, shore property is private, no picture was available to him--a picture of St. John's Episcopal Church there substituting, but several other interesting sites appear that will interest Updike readers. Here is the list of pictures available:
117 Philadelphia Avenue, Shillington, PA (1932-1945); A Sandstone Farmhouse, Plowville, Pennsylvania (1945-1950); 26 East Street, Ipswich, Massachusetts (1958-1970); Updike rents a one-room office, above a restaurant and overlooking the Ipswich River, in the Caldwell Building, South Main Street, Ipswich (1961); Labor-in-Vain Road, Ipswich (1970-1974); Updike's apartment 151 Beacon Street, Boston (1974-1976); 58 West Main Street, Georgetown, Massachusetts (1976-1982); Updike moves in 1982 to a house in Beverly Farms, Massachusetts and attends St. John's Episcopal Church (shown).
http://lang.nagoya-u.ac.jp/~matsuoka/AmeLit.html
An unbelievably wonderful page dedicated to the full range of authors of American literature developed by Professor Mitsuharu Matsuoka at Nagoya University in Japan. He lists web addresses and commentary sites for 784! American authors born between 1853 and 1963--a truly phenomenal achievement and marvelous literary resource.
A segment of the Joyce Carol Oates Home Page where she comments on Updike's work. Her special webpage is beautiful piece of work: Celestial Timepiece: A Joyce Carol Oates Home Page. The address is http://jco.usfca.edu/
The John Updike Author Price Guide is published by Quill & Brush Press. They produce author lists which provide chronologically organized bibliographical and publishing detail (first issues and first editions, limited editions, number of copies published, recent pricing levels, etc.). The last Updike list was updated in January 1998 and the publishing information is still valuable for books and materials to that time.
http://www.books-rare.com/searcheng.htm
For Updike book collectors this BOOKS-RARE is an unbelievably useful site with search engine connections to Advanced Book Exchange http://www.abebooks.com - 1,317 dealer database of over 3,000,000 books. Pick up their free book database program while you visit. Well worth the effort of the download. Antiqbook http://www.antiqbook.nl/database/index.html - for those who enjoy books with an international flair. Based in Holland with 30 dealers, over 300,000 titles, and 200,000 pieces of old graphics art. Bibliofind http://208.144.214.69/cgi-bin/texis.exe/search.vor - lists over 5 million books. "Picked by Yahoo Internet Life as the #1 Favorite Site of 1997" where books are offered for sale by more than 1600 booksellers worldwide. Bibliocity - http://www.bibliocity.com/bib-bin/show?c=0 - Database handling over 45 dealers, 120,000 books, with a combined inventory of $17,000,000. An attractive site with visual appeal. This site can probably be compared to a boutique with matching decor, quality, name brands, and price. Interloc - http://daniel.interloc.com/ -- my personal favorite--is one of the oldest and largest book search databases with an inventory of over 3,000,000 books from about 1,800 dealers. Search mechanism is nice with criteria that lets you select lists within price ranges. They also provide useful links for additional collecting information. MX Bookfinder - http://www.mxbf.com/ The MX BookFinder is a free, all-in-one, meta-search engine that runs fast combined searches on several sites (including Interloc, ABE, Bibliofind, and Bibliocity), and returns the results in a single list. For refined searches, you might want to try some of the other search engines. There are also more specialized links liste, so by all means go and browse. A really superb set of sites.
Send your information, questions, and comments about this webpage by clicking the following link:
"When a natural discourse paints a passion or an effect, one feels within oneself the truth of what one reads, which was there before, although one did not know it. Hence one is inclined to love him who makes us feel it, for he has not shown his own riches, but ours." -- Blaise Pascal.
Quoted by John Updike in his1964 inagural remarks upon being elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters. A Century of Arts and Letters, p. 183.
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"Zeus had loved his old friend, and lifted him up, and set him among the stars as the constellation Sagittarius. Here, in the Zodiac, now above, now below the horizon, he assists in the regulation of our destinies, though in this latter time few living mortals cast their eyes respectfully toward Heaven, and fewer still sit as students to the stars."
The Centaur (1963), page 299.
"If there was ever such a species as the Protestant novelist, comparable to that much discussed animal, the Catholic novelist, Mr. Updike may be its last surviving example."
David Lodge, The New York Times Book Review, 31 August 1986
Click Here to Go Back to Content Links
The red number is the total number of "hits" since the website's inauguration--with some brief omissions because of electronic glitches.
As of 25 August 2008 at 4 p.m. the correct count was
552,294
NOTE: This additional counter records daily useage since the inauguration of the last website counter. Current useage generally runs between 100 and 150 daily "hits."
The counter malfunction returned and it was re-installed. That is why it shows such a small use number. Counting therefore started all over after 9 1/2 years.
Counter installed 6/23/2006
The materials on this webpage and its section links are copyrighted for literary non-commercial uses. No other uses of its contents are permitted.