Seniors #4 journal--John Updike

NOTE: Read this post before the first test this Friday, October 7. Be able to recall important details about John Updike. You do NOT need to read the linked interview before the test.

NOTE: THIS IS A JOURNAL ASSIGNMENT, BUT YOU DO NOT NEED TO POST YOUR RESPONSE. PRINT OUT TO HAND IN AT THE END OF THE QUARTER WITH THE REST OF YOUR JOURNAL WRITINGS.

Your first assigned short story, The Lucid Eye in Silver Town, is a partially autobiographical account of its author, the young John Updike. Jay, the young boy in the story, is from some "hick town" in PA, as his father says in his sad, self-deprecating manner; Updike himself hailed from Shillington, a small town close to Reading, PA. Before he passed away in January 2009 at the age of 76, Updike was still reading and writing as much as ever.

Once a young man frustrated with a stalled career as a cartoonist, he tried his hand at fiction. His description of his first effort to write should encourage those of you who are intimidated or insecure in your own ability: "It's like sort of a horse you don't know is there, but if you jump on the back there is something under you that begins to move and gallop. So it's clearly a wonderful imaginary world that you enter when you begin to write fiction."

Updike went on to achieve the rare daily double of both popular and literary success, his novels read equally on airplanes and in college classrooms. His greatest gift was his ability to make us care about everyday people doing everyday things, a trait that makes him particularly American, this celebration of the common man.

Visit this web page and read the Updike interview.

The entire interview?

Well, as much or as little as you need to in order to respond to this prompt:

Respond to any one or some of Updike's interview answers in this interview. He talks about a variety of subjects: his childhood, his experience with teachers, his early appreciation of reading, his writing theories, teaching a creative writing class, the American Dream, etc. You may merely respond in a agree/disagree--like/dislike manner OR relate his (and your) responses to "The Lucid Eye in Silver Town."

This represents one exercise in the "critical" side of the course. You might not find this journal or Updike's interview particularly exciting, but I'm hoping that you at least find it insightful. Let's face it. When was the last time you read serious musings on fiction from a serious writer of fiction? Maybe never?

Remember, write an minimum of 25 blog lines or 200 words.