With heavy hearts we report the death of longtime John Updike Society member Andrew J. Moorhouse, whom many members first met when he attended the society’s second biennial conference in Boston in 2012.
According to a post his family created on his Facebook page, Andrew “died peacefully on Tuesday, September 24, after a year of ill health and a short-lived battle with a secondary CNS lymphoma which took root in his brain.
“Andrew would have used his unique talent with words to craft this message full of beautiful allegories, imagery and metaphors but sadly we have neither his brains nor his brilliance.
“Many will know Andrew through his Facebook and social media, which he used to connect with like-minded people across the world. Andrew was a generous and loving husband, father, brother and friend. As well as a loyal Dale fan. He will be greatly missed.”
Updike Society members will certainly miss him. Andrew was a gentle and quiet force of nature who, members may recall, was fresh off of a kidney transplant when he talked about becoming a fine letterpress edition publisher of poetry. As he told Body online literary magazine in 2021,
“I have always been a keen reader. My favorite authors generally are American novelists but also British poets. A collector too. I like beautifully printed and bound signed, limited editions. I collected John Updike’s books—it was Updike who said: ‘a book is beautiful in its relation to the human hand, its relation to the human eye, to the human brain, and to the human spirit.’ I felt the same way.”
Inspired by Updike and Updike small-press limited edition publisher William Ewert, Andrew contacted UK Poet Laureate Simon Armitage, whose work he collected, asking if he’d be interested in working with him to produce fine press editions of his works. Armitage was interested, and in October 2013, Andrew started Fine Press Poetry and officially became a small press publisher with his first book, In Memory of Water, poems by Armitage. Many more books followed.
Andrew was indeed an insightful reader of Updike who could talk about Updike’s books on the same level as any Ph.D. or much-published scholar. He was interesting and intelligent and a delight to be around. The John Updike Society is poorer without him, and we offer our condolences to his family: Rosie, Rebecca, and James. He made the world a better place.