John Updike

[highdrifter]

Today is a sad day for modern literature...

 

My father just called me to announce the passing of the great novelist and poet, Mr. John Updike.

 

I was introduced to his writting at a young age and grew up closely with the Rabbit novels (for which he won the Pullitzer) and more recently, books like "Towards the End of Time" and "Terrorist". To me, his prose was fluid and absolutely intoxicating.

 

He's no doubt touched many on this board and will be sorely missed. He died at age 76.

 

For you John, I will tilt my glass.

 

Here's one of my favourite poems from him. Puts a smile to my face every time I recite it. I hope it will do the same for everyone here.

 

"Dea Ex Machina"

 

My love is like Mies van der Rohe’s

“Machine for living”; she

Divested of her underclothes,

Suggests efficiency.

 

Her supple shoulders call to mind

A set of bevelled gears;

Her lower jaw has been aligned

To hinge behind her ears.

 

Her hips, sweet ball-and-socket joints,

Are padded to perfection;

Each knee, with its patella, points

In just the right direction.

 

Her fingertips remind me of

A digital computer;

She couldn’t be, my well-tooled love,

A millimeter cuter.

 

RIP Budday

 

cheers

HD

Edited January 28, 2009 by Highdrifter

[solopaddler]

A great loss indeed.

 

 

"It skims in through the eye, and by means of the utterly delicate retina hurls shadows like insect legs inward for translation. Then an immense space opens up in silence and an endlessly fecund sub-universe the writer descends, and asks the reader to descend after him, not merely to gain instructions but also to experience delight, the delight of mind freed from matter and exultant in the strength it has stolen from matter."

 

 

Thank you John.

[highdrifter]

Good one Mike. That's a jaw dropper of a quote. It's like Zappa on acid..

 

"Dreams come true; without that possibility, nature would not incite us to have them."