Trevor Meek, of The Local News (Ipswich, Mass.), published a Jan. 31, 2026 piece on the Selected Letters of John Updike that began, “Living in Ipswich in the 1960s and ’70s with John Updike as a neighbor meant playing a … Continue reading →

In his introduction to an interview he conducted with James Schiff, Joe Donahue wrote, “John Updike remains one of the most admired and prolific voices in American Literature. Over five decades he produced novels, short stories, poems, criticism, and essays … Continue reading →

James Schiff’s long-awaited Selected Letters of John Updike will be released on Oct. 21, 2025, with a reading-booksigning-publication party scheduled that evening at the Salmagundi Club in New York City, where Schiff is in town to convene with other members of The … Continue reading →

Members of The John Updike Society are looking forward to the release of the Selected Letters of John Updike, edited by James Schiff and scheduled for October publication by Knopf, Updike’s main publisher since 1959. Members who attend the Roth-Updike Conference will … Continue reading →

Knopf, now a division of Penguin-Random House, just released cover art for Selected Letters of John Updike, edited by Updike scholar and John Updike Society vice-president James Schiff. The hefty hardcover (900 pages) is roughly 6×9″ and slated for October 21, … Continue reading →

One of the March 10, 2024 letters to The Observer (U.K.), The Guardian‘s Sunday magazine, writes in a letter given the headline “Updike was no monk”: “Tomiwa Owolade writes persuasively about the rewards of ritual in a simple life, but he … Continue reading →

In his May 21, 2020 article on “The Philip Roth Archive,” Jesse Tisch described “A fan’s obsessive rummage through the letters and papers of the writer who died two years ago today” that “reveals a playful, funny, brilliant man.” The … Continue reading →

Writers write. And the great ones were often great at correspondence. Like Ernest Hemingway, John Updike wrote for popular publications of his day, and like Hemingway he was a proliferate letter-writer. How MUCH of a letter-writer is now coming to … Continue reading →

The John Updike Letters Project For those who may have missed the announcement, The John H. Updike Literary Trust has named John Updike Society vice president James Schiff as editor of a volume of John Updike’s letters. Schiff, who edits The … Continue reading →