{"id":2605,"date":"2014-11-09T06:26:26","date_gmt":"2014-11-09T12:26:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/?p=2605"},"modified":"2014-11-09T06:28:38","modified_gmt":"2014-11-09T12:28:38","slug":"begley-bio-is-an-amazon-best-book-of-2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/2014\/11\/09\/begley-bio-is-an-amazon-best-book-of-2014\/","title":{"rendered":"Begley bio is an Amazon Best Book of 2014"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Screen<\/a>Amazon.com<\/strong> jumped on the best books bandwagon with a list of the Top 100 books of 2014<\/a>, and Adam Begley’s bio, Updike<\/em>, measured up pretty well\u00a0at #11:<\/p>\n

Updike<\/em> is Adam Begley\u2019s masterful, much-anticipated biography of one of the most celebrated figures in American literature: Pulitzer Prize-winning author John Updike\u2014a candid, intimate, and richly detailed look at his life and work.<\/p>\n

In this magisterial biography, Adam Begley offers an illuminating portrait of John Updike, the acclaimed novelist, poet, short-story writer, and critic who saw himself as a literary spy in small-town and suburban America, who dedicated himself to the task of transcribing \u201cmiddleness with all its grits, bumps and anonymities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Updike<\/em> explores the stages of the writer\u2019s pilgrim\u2019s progress: his beloved home turf of Berks County, Pennsylvania; his escape to Harvard; his brief, busy working life as the golden boy at The New Yorker<\/em>; his family years in suburban Ipswich, Massachusetts; his extensive travel abroad; and his retreat to another Massachusetts town, Beverly Farms, where he remained until his death in 2009. Drawing from in-depth research as well as interviews with the writer\u2019s colleagues, friends, and family, Begley explores how Updike\u2019s fiction was shaped by his tumultuous personal life\u2014including his enduring religious faith, his two marriages, and his first-hand experience of the \u201cadulterous society\u201d he was credited with exposing in the bestselling Couples<\/em>.<\/p>\n

With a sharp critical sensibility that lends depth and originality to his analysis, Begley probes Updike\u2019s best-loved works\u2014from Pigeon Feathers<\/em> to The Witches of Eastwick<\/em> to the Rabbit tetralogy\u2014and reveals a surprising and deeply complex character fraught with contradictions: a kind man with a vicious wit, a gregarious charmer who was ruthlessly competitive, a private person compelled to spill his secrets on the printed page. Updike<\/em> offers an admiring yet balanced look at this national treasure, a master whose writing continues to resonate like no one else\u2019s.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Amazon.com jumped on the best books bandwagon with a list of the Top 100 books of 2014, and Adam Begley’s bio, Updike, measured up pretty well\u00a0at #11: Updike is Adam Begley\u2019s masterful, much-anticipated biography of one of the most celebrated … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2605","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lists"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2605"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2605\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2609,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2605\/revisions\/2609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}