Endpoint and Other Poems
by John Updike
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Book Summary Information
Author: John UpdikeEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2009-03-31
ISBN: 0307272869
Number of pages: 97
Publisher: Knopf
Book Reviews of Endpoint and Other Poems
Book Review: See ya, Dutchy
Summary: 5 Stars
Once I heard a neighbor refer to our author as "little Johnny Updike" and when Rabbit ran, he drove down Rt 222S not too far from my door. To me and a friend or two it trumped Kerouac. A little more subtle, you might say. One book a year followed, just about, mainly the novels, where the protagonist never failed to tell me exactly how the world was going to feel in ten years when I reached the author's age. I am really, really going to miss that.
Several writers have commented on the greatness of these poems. That does them a disservice, I think. Updike doesn't show in the major anthologies and there's reason for that.
These poems show a cannily perceptive person facing his old age and then, suddenly, his impending death. The first half dozen are recent occasional pieces on his last birthdays
"the snowdrops lie/in drenched, bedraggled clumps/their tired news becoming weeds..."
Then a half dozen or so on the final illness
"My wife of thirty years is on the phone./I get a busy signal, and I know/she's in her grief and needs to organize/consulting friends. But me, I need her voice..."
There follow twenty or so assembled to fill out this book on varied subjects and occasions. They're marvelous Updike. Updike on TV, Updike on Helen of Troy, Updike on Monica Lewinski, Updike on Updike's career. How can there be no more Updike?
I searched out his Shillington home long ago. Only a few years ago I found the hardscrabble, woodsy farm in which he and the Mother lived. Tiny little farmhouse defaced with prefabs sprinkled about. Up the hill is the Lutheran church where the pastor shared his shocking thought that little Johnny would only be seeing Granny in heaven again in some very abstract and meaningless way. Updike said he felt like reporting this heresy to every adult he knew.
The poems in every section feature Reading and environs, his family, his schoolmates, the Sweet Shop... small city life in Pennsylvania Dutch country.
"...I had to move/ to beautiful New England - its triple deckers, whited chuches, unplowed streets-/to learn how drear and deadly life can be."
Did I say I'm going to miss this guy?
Summary of Endpoint and Other Poems
A stunning collection of poems that John Updike wrote during the last seven years of his life and put together only weeks before he died for this, his final book.The opening sequence, ?Endpoint,? is made up of a series of connected poems written on the occasions of his recent birthdays and culminates in his confrontation with his final illness. He looks back on the boy that he was, on the family, the small town, the people, and the circumstances that fed his love of writing, and he finds endless delight and solace in ?turning the oddities of life into words.?
?Other Poems? range from the fanciful (what would it be like to be a stolen Rembrandt painting? he muses) to the celebratory, capturing the flux of life. A section of sonnets follows, some inspired by travels to distant lands, others celebrating the idiosyncrasies of nature in his own backyard.
For John Updike, the writing of poetry was always a special joy, and this final collection is an eloquent and moving testament to the life of this extraordinary writer.
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