He had met the little death that awaits all athletes. At the start of his own long career, he captured the pathos of another man’s finish: “On the car radio as I drove home, I heard that Williams, his own man to the end, had decided not to accompany the team to New York. At 28, he published “ Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu,” an essay on Ted Williams’ final game at Fenway Park. His fluid, assured, loose-limbed style was the envy of three generations of writers. Updike was that rare thing: a literary prodigy.
Updike has not been a victim of cancel culture. His is a striking case study in the politics of literary reputation in a time of generational upheaval. Thirty years later, he is largely an object of resentment. In 1990, when Rabbit at Rest was published to broad acclaim, ending John Updike’s magisterial Rabbit Angstrom quartet, Updike was arguably the most admired writer in the United States and also its most characteristically American.
