Customer Reviews

In the Beauty of the Lilies

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This book was my introduction to Updike's work, and I must say I was impressed. "In the Beauty of the Lilies", the title of which is taken from a verse in the "Battle Hymn of the Republic", is, at least superficially, an examination of the role of religion in American life. The plot spans the whole of the 20th century and chronicles the lives of four generations of the Wilmot family. The history of American film is woven into the novel and used an effective metaphor for the personal and societal upheavals that beset the characters. The reader can't help but pick up some interesting facts about the history of film, but I found that sometimes the author allowed historical details to detract from the flow of the story. It is difficult to explain the psychological subtleties of the novel without being a "spoiler". The scope of the book is not limited to organised religion per se. The book is really about the basic human need for some kind of faith or committment, be it religious or not. Updike seems to be talking about the intimate link between personal integrity and a belief in something, or someone outside of oneself. "In the Beauty of the Lilies" is a powerful allegory which helped to bring my own existential beliefs into sharper focus. Since Amazon does not welcome explicit discussion of authors themselves, I will not reveal Updikes' own metaphysical stance. (Those who are interested can do a literature search and find out for yourselves.) I was impressed, however, that the author did not allow his work to become mere propaganda for his own metaphysical beliefs. The subtlety and complexity of the book is one of its greatest strengths. The characters are well-developed and plot is engageing enought to interest even those who prefer to gloss over the philosophical aspects of the book. I welcome any email discussion from people who have already "In the Beauty of the Lilies".

I found the scope of Updike's vision to be quite breath-taking: twentieth century America redrawn as perhaps the saddest place on Earth to be now that none of us can any longer be quite so sure that God is in his heaven and all's right with the world. With each turn of the generations Updike turns the question slowly around: the pastor whose doubts finally surface and push him out of his job; the son who doesn't want to wade back in to the God question; the famous daughter who sees God so clearly and finds doubt a bit bemusing, but then what God is she seeing? and finally the young dropout who falls in with an apocalyptic mountainside madman with precisely the passionate commitment which the family has never had. In a sense what we have here are four strategies for 'coping' with the enormous emptiness of our modern world, and I found the closing paragraphs particularly powerful, highlighting the projection of our self-doubts and confused partial resolutions into the next generation's inevitable confrontation with these same issues. Along the way Updike keeps his eyes wide open and finds life in the details- the only place it could ever be after all.

I diasgree with some of the reviewers here who find it self-indulgent and pointless, but I do think that the four portraits lack an overall structure which might have sustained the long narrative slightly better. Yes in places we are left immersed in detail, but perhaps that's not beside the point in the end. As to faith, I don't much agree with Updike but his grasp of the issues seems to me a sure one, with the horns of the various theological dilemmas well grasped (one of his usual strengths).

A troubling novel, not for the faint-hearted.

John Updike writes a sprawling story here following one family through four generations in the twentieth century and their very different relationships with God and cinema. The patriarch, Clarence Wilmot, is a Presbyterian minister who suddenly loses his faith in God. Believing that there is no God, he quits the ministry (which, due to outside pressure, is easier said than done). Clarence's honesty, if nothing else, must be appreciated. Someone with less integrity might have stayed in the ministry and become a precursor to John Shelby Spong (sorry, had to get that in). Clarence attempts to sell encyclopedias door-to-door, but increasingly spends more time at the movie theater. Is he looking for salvation in Hollywood?

Clarence's son, Teddy, has the most ordinary story of the Wilmot clan. Unambitious, though not lazy, he is content with the quiet life of a postman in a small Delaware town. Teddy never attends church, and seems to be unreligious, yet by marrying a handicapped girl seems to display an acceptance of the disenfranchised that has a spark of Christlikeness.

The next section of the story concerns Teddy's daughter Essie, who to me is the most problematic character in this book. Essie is constantly aware of God, and indeed would not know what it was like to not believe in God. Yet Essie's narcissism and self-centeredness betrays a very shallow faith. Infatuated with herself from a young age, she grows up to be a movie star, displaying the typical "godless" lifestyle that many perceive as typical of Hollywood. Belief in God is her "secret", and she keeps it well-hidden indeed, even from her own son.

Essie (who takes the name Alma DeMott--by the way, doesn't this sound more like a name for a star of the 1920's rather than the 1950's?) is a particularly neglectful mother to her son Clark. Clark becomes the typical Hollywood kid: drugs, sex, fast cars, and a generally shiftless lifestyle. He gets seduced by a Branch Davidian-type cult (a little TOO much like the Branch Davidians--Updike was trying too hard to be in step with current events here) and the story comes to a climax that is a little too predictable, although with an important twist, due to Clark's renegade nature. In a stange way, life has come full-circle for this family: Clarence loses faith in God and attempts to find escape in the movies, and his great-grandson loses faith in Hollywood and finds escape in a cult group and their counterfeit God.

The back cover of this book enthusiastically describes it as the story of the 20th century in the US "seen through the prism of the movies." But I'd argue that the movies definitely take second place to religion as the driving force of American culture in Updike's view--and that certainly hasn't changed since this novel was written. "In the Beauty of the Lilies" is the story of religion in the life of a family--first for the brooding minister Clarence, who suddenly loses all faith on a totally ordinary summer afternoon at home. Clarence's son Teddy, the most "ordinary" character in the book, will never forgive God for abandoning his father and for the consequences his family suffered as a result. The third generation is Alma, formerly Essie, a movie star in the age of glamour, with her touching faith in a child-like father God watching over things. But God lets her son Clark wander off into the territory of false religion with catastrophic results.

I liked this book a lot--Updike's erudite writing is always a pleasure, and his insights into our so-called godless society, where religion permeates everything, were very astute. The "Teddy" story was a bit slow moving, perhaps deliberately, for it is followed by the meteoric rise--and fall--of his daughter's career. As for the story of Clark, we know what's coming, and we read on with growing dread towards the inevitable conclusion. An extra bonus was the very realistic rendering of Paterson NJ in the early 20th century and the painful silk workers' strike. Updike based this section of the book on the fine research of Steve Golin, a historian I know well. This novel is well worth your while.

I admit that I tried some of Mr. Updike over the years,and never even made it to first base. It seemed he was way overpraised.But then I chanced upon IN THE BEAUTY OF THE LILIES. I'm glad I did.Mr. Updike rolls out a yarn here that seems to cover just about the entire American 20th century. All the characters are true to life, from the factory owners to the loyal union men in the beginning,and especially the Wilmot family over several generations.His sense of time and place is perfect. Paterson,NJ, makes a fine central location as the silk capital of the USA. A Methodist minister loses his faith,startling his wife, since he could lose his central position in the community. The good minister visits the church elder,and what follows may be the best discussion of religious faith in fiction. But this churchman cannot go on acting against his beliefs (make that non-beliefs). So he moves,his family fortunes go into decline,as predicted by his wife,and he attempts to sell encyclopedias to the mainly working class blue collar community...Now,all this is woven around together as in a movie reel,since the Hollywood Dream Machine plays a strong role throughout the novel.As the future unfolds,many other interesting segments follow,like the honeymoon in Philadelphia, the honeymooners stay in the grand Belleview Hotel, and their sense of being overwhelmed by this great city.Nice plug for a sometimes neglected great American city! This book is like unfolding a huge and beautiful tapestry that slowly turns into a magic carpet ride. A young lady family member in the 1930's becomes a very famous actress,and Mr. Updike gives wondrous descriptions of this event. Her son becomes a bit strange,and in searching for something,some faith that his forbear had long ago lost,ends up in an even stranger cult.Here the book may fall off slightly. Nonetheless,you'll keep turning the pages to the very end. The last line: "The children". Maybe I'll grab my copy, and give it a second go around!

Among Updike's best works. This is the story of one family thru four generations, from a Presbyterian minister of the early twentieth-century, who loses his faith in God and substitutes that with a fascination for motion pictures, thru his son, a local postmaster, to that man's daughter, an actress who becomes a Hollywood superstar, and finally into the modern era when the actress' son gains heroic infamy for his actions as a radical participant in a cult stand-off reminiscent of the Branch Davidian disaster of 1993. I loved the depth with which Updike infused the passing of time, how he slid era into era and made the inhabitants of each generation seem so in place and representative of their age. This is the kind of book that draws in the curious and converts them to believers in how strong a novel can be as conveyer of a message. However, if there is one weakness here in this tale, it is the way Alma, the main character in the third generation, achieved international fame, and yet Updike seemed to rush thru her rise and merely told of it without letting us feel its culmination. He simply stated that it had come to pass, she was famous, she had starred opposite this major star and that one, but it never felt right, somehow. I don't blame Updike for this, exactly, and think this also serves to point out the weakness of the written word when it is used to describe a visual medium, as was that case. I was also a little saddened by how this novel ended, and felt it was a needlessly dim conclusion to nine decades of involvement with a number of deep-souled men and women. I rated four stars instead of five for this reason and for the facts mentioned in the rise-to-fame section, but In the Beauty of the Lilies was a wonderful book that packed a lot into its pages and I really enjoyed it. It serves to reinforce that John Updike is an American master.

Sometimes I've felt Mr Updike has tended to show off his erudition and skill with language at the expense of telling a story so that the reader has been at times more conscious of his rich vocabulary, baroque permutations and Ossianic sonorities at the expense of what was happening and why. In this novel language is very much the servant of the tale and it's a tale very well told. I think also that the story of religion, of the movies and money is central to the story of the USA in the 20th century, so I think apart from being a really good read, it is a great study of American culture and the individual ambitions, needs, hopes, and desires of the characters who make up its fascinating history. Without wishing to sound pompous or make the novel seem portentous and inaccessible which it very much is not, I think it's an important book. And it is as enjoyable as RABBIT, RUN, and there's been a lot of water under the bridge since that was written, so to speak.

Updike has never been a favorite.This novel is an exception.He wrote a moving work on American values and the shift of said values in post-19th century America.Updike's skill with syntax and enchantment had me mesmirized for most of the novel.You get to truly feel for the protaginist and some of the other folks who reside in this magnificent tip-of-the-hat to the human spirit.Following the consumption of this near perfect example of what a seasoned writer can accomplish, i came away with my pores saturated with a sense of hope.

With an Updike novel, one doesn't typically need the ending to make sense of the whole. Each of the Rabbit books went on until, like that, they were done. In fact, Rabbit Angstrom summed up Updike's style best in "Rabbit at Rest" when he closed the saga with a simple: "enough". "In The Beauty of the Lilies" is the exception to this Updike rule.

Updike's examination of faith in the face of change and technology is interesting enough but only in the last few pages (which I won't reveal here) does the arc of the novel show itself. For Updike seems to be saying that the loss of blind faith, which so troubled Clarence Wilmot in part one, is not necessarily the tragedy we are led to believe. Rather, there are other things in play that make a life worth living. It's an interesting point and the view that the same loss of faith can just as easily give one's life ultimate meaning as rendering it meaningless is one that I definitely didn't see coming.

Much has been made of Updike's propensity to delve into detail regarding setting and historical fact. To those who find this troubling, I say go turn on the tv and don't bother with literature again. It's simply not for you. Sad, sad, sad.

Despite the fact that Updike chooses similar terrain over and over he never fails to have something new and interesting to say.

John Updike is more intelligent and can spin out beautiful prose like no other living author I know of. His retrospective look at 4 generations of an American family growing up with America in the topsy-turvy 20th Century, is wonderful reading. (I am biased in feeling that on his worst day Updike is worth 50 of any other American authors.) Updike's plot (as usual) is not the highlight, although the four generation structure does raise questions of nature, nuture, inheritance of tragic flaws and hidden strengths. The characters, both major and minor, never fail to engage the reader, and the offhand aphorisms and sharp (and frequently bittersweet) observations about life are not to be missed. Beware, at the outset there is a thick mass of detail about Presbyterian criticism, mush on, and later some detailed descriptions of the contents of drug stores, but hang in there. Updike usually has an experiment in mind, this time God is a character, who acts on the lives of the everyday folks in ways large and small. I say don't miss it because Mr. U. is truly a great author, and if you don't hurry up and read this one, he will publish another one soon, and you will fall farther behind