Yes, he was a literary giant, but literary giants have comic moments and can become the butt of jokes just like anyone else. This week two news pieces provided laughs at the late John Updike’s expense.

Aine Toner wrote a piece for the Belfast Telegraph titled “Blurbing it out: why you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover,” in which she interviewed writer Louise Willder on the occasion of the upcoming publication of Wilder’s new book, Blurb Your Enthusiasm: An A-Z of Literary Persuasion.

“I’ve got this letter from John Updike, which is one of my prized possessions,” Willder said. “I’d written a blurb for Couples and I can’t even remember the copy I wrote. I’m sure I would hate it now if I looked at it, but it’s a lovely letter from him. And at the end he just says, and he’s clearly not sure about it, ‘Oh my, have it your way.’ That’s how he signs off the letter!”

Closer to Updike territory, humor columnist Doug Brendel was inspired by the drought-exposed Lake Mead (Calif.) discoveries to speculate on what might be found in Ipswich under similar circumstances. In “Outsidah: If the dam goes, I’ll probably learn too much about Ipswich,” Brendel wrote, “The implications for Ipswich are clear. If the dam comes down, declining riverfront real estate values could be the least of people’s problems.

“In addition to a muddy hellscape of irate turtles and confused fish, decades’ worth of local mysteries will be suddenly and perhaps gruesomely solved.

“Children playing on the newly dried-out riverbank find a soggy box containing copies of John Updike’s novel Couples rounded up and chucked into the river by outraged neighbors in 1968.

“Hikers otherwise minding their own business stumble upon the carcass of that noisy dog that mysteriously disappeared from your neighborhood a couple years ago.

“It will be scandal after scandal.”