If you’ve been following The John Updike Society on Facebook or on this website you’ve noticed that the news as of late has been dominated by responses to the Adam Begley biography of John Updike. But what we haven’t considered is that every article and every review needs photos to go with the copy, and as Writer Pictures, a source that provides copyrighted material for the media, observes, the Begley biography has sparked an “Uptick in Updike Interest.”
You’ve no doubt read that the Begley-Updike connection is Begley’s father, Louis, who was a Harvard classmate of Updike’s, and the article also includes a photo of the elder Begley.
Words and Pictures, a romantic comedy that opens in theaters abroad on May 22, stars Clive Owen as a popular English teacher at a private high school who gets into an argument with the new art teacher, played by Juliette Binoche: Are words more important, or are pictures?
The two try to involve their students in the debate, and according to Harvey Karten, who saw an advance screening and reviewed the film for CompuServe ShowBiz, Owen tries to make his case by “quoting from the great authors with a special emphasis on John Updike, to paint metaphoric pictures.”
Karten’s full review also appears on Shockya.com.
The screenplay, in case you’re curious, was written by Gerald Di Pego, whose prior credits include Instinct (1999), Message in a Bottle (1999), and Sharky’s Machine (1981).
The ubiquitous Adam Begley has written a piece for The Wall Street Journal titled “Adam Begley on mighty mothers,” in which he names five books that feature dominant matriarchs. Given his recent biography of John Updike it’s no surprise that he included Updike, and even less of a surprise that the book he chose was Of the Farm, the novel that Updike has said was written about his mother. You need to subscribe to access the full article, which was published in the Bookshelf/Life & Culture section on May 16, 2014, but here’s what he had to say about Updike:
Of the Farm
By John Updike (1965)
4. There are only four voices in this gem of a novel, a fractious quartet performing under a spotlight in and around an elderly widow’s isolated Pennsylvania farmhouse. Joey Robinson, a 35-year-old mama’s boy, has brought his second wife, Peggy, and her young son to visit Joey’s garrulous, manipulative mother. By the second night, Joey’s mother has bullied him into agreeing that Peggy is vulgar and stupid and that divorcing his first wife was a mistake. After an emotional melee worthy of Edward Albee, mother and son achieve a kind of mutual forgiveness. But when all the skirmishes are done, and all the wounds more or less neatly bandaged, Joey and his mother engage in a bit of pointed banter about selling the farm after she is dead. She refers to it as “my farm,” and before he replies, Joey reflects: “We were striking terms, and circumspection was needed. I must answer in our old language, our only language, allusive and teasing, that with conspiratorial tact declared nothing and left the past apparently unrevised.” He says, “Your farm? . . . I’ve always thought of it as our farm.” The mother-son conspiracy endures.
Blogger Mark Stevens published a Q&A with Updike biographer Adam Begley on May 13 in which Begley talks about the issues central to Updike’s work and life.
Among Begley’s responses:
“I think his misbehavior was very fruitful for him: he made hay out of his peccadillos—or his sins, really, if you want to talk about it that way. The key passage for [me] is in Roger’s Version, when Roger finally allows Verna—his half-niece, his half-sister’s daughter—to seduce him and they are lying on the soiled futon in a rundown housing estate and they have just committed quasi-incest and adultery, because he’s married, and at that moment he, this character Roger, has this great religious epiphany, which is that even in abasement you are subject to God. I think that is a crystallization of his attitude, if you will, of his attitude toward his own transgressions and his religious faith. Both were equally important to him. I don’t think John Updike could have been the artist he was without his philandering and I don’t think he could have been the artist he was without his faith.”
On May 30 Blackbird Theater of Nashville, Tenn., will conclude its 2013-14 season with the world premiere of Roger’s Version, a play adapted from the Updike novel of the same name.
“Having received special permission from the Updike estate, Blackbird Artistic Director Wes Driver has written and will direct this original adaptation. . . ,” ArtsNash reports.
“There are plenty of stories that entertain you. Fewer that genuinely move you,” the director writes. “And then there are those very rare ones that, for some reason or other, cut you to the core—or seemingly raid your psyche—expressing your most deeply felt passions and perspectives. The characters are so vivid, you feel like you know them. Intimately. Because, truth be told, they seem to be reflections and extensions of yourself. That’s what Roger’s Version is to me.”
Here’s the full story, with photos.
In 2010, John Updike Society members convened in Reading, Pa., for the 1st Biennial John Updike Society Conference, and after visiting Suffolk University and Boston two years later, we return to Alvernia University October 1-4, 2014 for the 3rd Biennial John Updike Society Conference. 3rd Conference registration form
The John Updike Society is comprised of 260 members who live in 15 different countries, and our conferences have been an enjoyable time to meet new people and old friends, and to talk about all things Updike with like-minded individuals. Call for Papers extended
Adam Begley’s biography of Updike has been everywhere in the news, and Adam (right) will be our closing keynote speaker for the conference. Our other keynote speaker is Chip Kidd, who has been called the “rock star” of graphic designers because he has crafted so many iconic images, among them the cover for Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park and, of course, many of John Updike’s dust jackets. He had a great deal of interaction with Updike, and we look forward to his and Begley’s remarks.
Alvernia University will welcome us back this year, with university president and society member Tom Flynn hosting a reception and members getting the chance to spend some time in The John Updike Society Archives at Alvernia.
This conference we celebrate the society’s acquisition of The John Updike Childhood Home, with an afternoon tour of the house, walking tour of Shillington, and picnic lunch on the 
grounds of the house. We’ll also get to see the Reading Public Museum, where Updike’s interest in art and antiquities was partly shaped, and where The Drinking Girl that inspired him is again on display. The museum will even mount a special exhibit for us of items Updike mentioned which have since been in storage, and a reception there will be sponsored by Albright College, which has links to Updike—the most recent being their donation of wood from the old bleachers that was used to create new storm windows for The John Updike Childhood Home.
Every conference registrant will get a t-shirt commemorating their visit to the house, the first society event to be held there. As with the first conference, there will be a session featuring Updike classmates and another by the Updike family. We’ll also take a bus tour of the City Park, Pagoda, other Rabbit, Run sites, and sites that reflect the local flavor of an area that meant so much to John Updike.
The conference hotel is the historic Abe Lincoln in downtown reading, which is a safe walking distance from numerous restaurants and bars, among them The Peanut Bar, where a young John Updike hung out when he worked for the Reading Eagle newspaper. Continue reading
Academics are a busy lot, and with the semester just now ending for some, people are just now turning to thoughts of possible paper topics. As a result, The John Updike Society has extended its Call for Papers deadline for the Third Biennial John Updike Society Conference in Reading, Pa., hosted by Alvernia University October 1-4, 2014. The new deadline is JULY 15, 2014.
After a brief hiatus, The Other John Updike Archive is posting again:
“In Every Dream Home A Heartache”
“Will you still love me tomorrow?”
“Couples: The story you’re about to read is true…”
“Celestial Seasonings (on being JUish)”
Here is the link to the National Endowment for the Humanities 2008 Jefferson Lecture by John Updike:
Webcast intro, lecture, and slideshow
“The Clarity of Things: What Is American about American Art?”