Begley, Adam Updike ISBN 13: 9780061896453

Updike - Hardcover

9780061896453: Updike
View all copies of this ISBN edition:
 
 

Updike is Adam Begley’s masterful, much-anticipated biography of one of the most celebrated figures in American literature: Pulitzer Prize-winning author John Updike—a candid, intimate, and richly detailed look at his life and work.

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 “middleness with all its grits, bumps and anonymities.”

Updike explores the stages of the writer’s pilgrim’s 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; 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’s colleagues, friends, and family, Begley explores how Updike’s fiction was shaped by his tumultuous personal life—including his enduring religious faith, his two marriages, and his first-hand experience of the “adulterous society” he was credited with exposing in the bestselling Couples.

With a sharp critical sensibility that lends depth and originality to his analysis, Begley probes Updike’s best-loved works—from Pigeon Feathers to The Witches of Eastwick to the Rabbit tetralogy—and 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 offers an admiring yet balanced look at this national treasure, a master whose writing continues to resonate like no one else’s.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

Review:

An Amazon Best Book of the Month, April 2014: Especially with fiction, It’s often useful to separate artists from their art, to assume that a novel, or an entire body of work, isn’t thinly veiled autobiography. Updike, Adam Begley’s exhaustive and revealing account of the American master’s life, begs us to reconsider that doctrine. Detailed yet readable, it goes far beyond describing the chronology of this unsurprisingly complex (and often paradoxical) character, layering on the lit crit where John Updike’s real life bled into his novels. Essential for admirers and illuminating for anyone with an interest in literature, Updike already merits consideration as one of the best biographies of 2014. --Jon Foro

From the Back Cover:

In this eye-opening, authoritative biography, Adam Begley offers a captivating portrait of John Updike, the author who saw himself as a literary spy in small-town and suburban America, and who dedicated himself to the task of transcribing "middleness with all its grits, bumps, and anonymities."

Updike explores the stages of the writer's pilgrim's 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; 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 on in-depth archival research as well as interviews with the writer's family, friends, and colleagues, Begley explores how Updike's fiction was shaped by his tumultuous personal life—including his enduring religious faith, his two marriages, and his firsthand experience of the "adulterous society" he was credited with exposing in the bestselling novel Couples.

With a sharp critical sensibility, Begley probes Updike's best-loved works—from Pigeon Feathers to The Witches of Eastwick to the Rabbit tetralogy—and 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.

Candid, intimate, and utterly absorbing, Updike is a masterful biography of a national treasure whose writing continues to resonate like no one else's.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

  • PublisherHarper
  • Publication date2014
  • ISBN 10 0061896454
  • ISBN 13 9780061896453
  • BindingHardcover
  • Edition number1
  • Number of pages576
  • Rating

Other Popular Editions of the Same Title

9780061896460: Updike

Featured Edition

ISBN 10:  ISBN 13:  9780061896460
Publisher: Harper Perennial, 2015
Softcover

  • 9780062410894: Updike

    Harper..., 2015
    Softcover

Top Search Results from the AbeBooks Marketplace

Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover First Edition Quantity: 1
Seller:
BooksByLisa
(Highland Park, IL, U.S.A.)

Book Description Hardcover. Condition: New. 1st Edition. Stored new pristine condition sanitized the new. Book. Seller Inventory # ABE-1667058856663

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 16.00
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: FREE
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover Quantity: 1
Seller:
Books Unplugged
(Amherst, NY, U.S.A.)

Book Description Condition: New. Buy with confidence! Book is in new, never-used condition. Seller Inventory # bk0061896454xvz189zvxnew

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 23.16
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: FREE
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Seller Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover Quantity: 10
Seller:
booksXpress
(Bayonne, NJ, U.S.A.)

Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. Seller Inventory # 9780061896453

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 23.17
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: FREE
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover Quantity: 1
Seller:
Book Deals
(Tucson, AZ, U.S.A.)

Book Description Condition: New. New! This book is in the same immaculate condition as when it was published. Seller Inventory # 353-0061896454-new

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 24.49
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: FREE
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper, NY (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover First Edition Quantity: 1
Seller:
Nilbog Books
(Portland, ME, U.S.A.)

Book Description Hardcover. Condition: New. Dust Jacket Condition: New. 1st Edition. This is a New and Unread copy of the first edition (1st printing). Includes photographs, index, bibliography. Seller Inventory # 045391

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 20.00
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: US$ 4.50
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper Collins Publishers (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover Quantity: > 20
Seller:
INDOO
(Avenel, NJ, U.S.A.)

Book Description Condition: New. Brand New. Seller Inventory # 0061896454

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 21.07
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: US$ 3.99
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover Quantity: 1
Seller:
GoldenWavesOfBooks
(Fayetteville, TX, U.S.A.)

Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New. Fast Shipping and good customer service. Seller Inventory # Holz_New_0061896454

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 24.55
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: US$ 4.00
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover Quantity: 1
Seller:
GoldBooks
(Austin, TX, U.S.A.)

Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New Copy. Customer Service Guaranteed. Seller Inventory # think0061896454

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 26.37
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: US$ 4.25
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover Quantity: 1
Seller:
Front Cover Books
(Denver, CO, U.S.A.)

Book Description Condition: new. Seller Inventory # FrontCover0061896454

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 30.01
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: US$ 4.30
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds
Stock Image

Begley, Adam
Published by Harper (2014)
ISBN 10: 0061896454 ISBN 13: 9780061896453
New Hardcover Quantity: 1
Seller:
Wizard Books
(Long Beach, CA, U.S.A.)

Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New. Seller Inventory # Wizard0061896454

More information about this seller | Contact seller

Buy New
US$ 52.30
Convert currency

Add to Basket

Shipping: US$ 3.50
Within U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds

There are more copies of this book

View all search results for this book