Higher Gossip: Essays and Criticism [Deckle Edge] [Hardcover]

John Updike (Author), Christopher Carduff (Editor)

Book Description

Release date: November 1, 2011

A collection both intimate and generous of the eloquent, insightful, beautifully written prose works that John Updike was compiling when he died in January 2009.

This collection of miscellaneous prose opens with a self-portrait of the writer in winter, a Prospero who, though he fears his most dazzling performances are behind him, reveals himself in every sentence to be in deep conversation with the sources of his magic. It concludes with a moving meditation on a modern world robbed of imagination--a world without religion, without art--and on the difficulties of faith in a disbelieving age. In between are previously uncollected stories and poems, a pageant of scenes from seventeenth-century Massachusetts, five late "golf dreams," and several of Updike's commentaries on his own work. At the heart of the book are his matchless reviews--of John Cheever, Ann Patchett, Toni Morrison, William Maxwell, John le Carré, and essays on Aimee Semple McPherson, Max Factor, and Albert Einstein, among others. Also included are two decades of art criticism--on Chardin, El Greco, Blake, Turner, Van Gogh, Max Ernest, and more.

Updike's criticism is gossip of the highest order, delivered in an intimate and generous voice.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“For my money . . . the late John Updike was the best American belletrist ever, and Higher Gossip . . . confirms everything I’ve believed about his brilliance, his versatility, and his depth.”—Larry McMurty, Harper’s
 
“As [Higher Gossip] reminds us, Updike was that rare creature: an all-around man of letters, a literary decathlete who brought to his criticism an insider’s understanding of craft and technique; a first-class appreciator of talent, capable of describing other artists’ work with nimble, pictorial brilliance; an ebullient observer, who could bring to essays about dinosaurs or golf or even the theory of relativity a contagious, boyish sense of wonder.”—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
 
“A timely reminder of the graceful companionship that Updike offered to his readers—a presence that will be sorely missed.”—The Christian Science Monitor --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

About the Author

John Updike was the author of more than sixty books, including collections of short stories, poems, and criticism. His novels have been honored with the Pulitzer Prize (twice), the National Book Award, and the Howells Medal of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Hugging the Shore, an earlier collection of essays and reviews, received the National Book Critics Circle Award for criticism. He died in January 2009.
 
Christopher Carduff, the editor of this volume, is a member of the staff of The Library of America.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 528 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; First Edition edition (November 1, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 9780307957153
• ISBN-13: 978-0307957153
• ASIN: 0307957152
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.5 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #277,059 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

John Updike was born in 1932, in Shillington, Pennsylvania. He graduated from Harvard College in 1954, and spent a year in Oxford, England, at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art. From 1955 to 1957 he was a member of the staff of The New Yorker, and since 1957 lived in Massachusetts. He was the father of four children and the author of more than fifty books, including collections of short stories, poems, essays, and criticism. His novels won the Pulitzer Prize (twice), the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Rosenthal Award, and the Howells Medal. A previous collection of essays, Hugging the Shore, received the 1983 National Book Critics Circle Award for criticism. John Updike died on January 27, 2009, at the age of 76.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 24 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Another chance to revel in Updike's genius December 6, 2011

By J. A Magill VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

If you are among the legions who paused in January 2009 to mourn John Updike passing, then Higher Gossip, a posthumous collection of essays, reviews, poems, and other writings, will make you cry all over again. While the title refers to an Updike quote regarding book reviews, this volume demonstrates that being one of America's greatest post-war novelists and short story writers was only part of his great talents. Indeed, when Updike died America lost one of its great - and most prolific - public intellectuals.

Like a broken pinata, what pours of this volume is a bounty of surprising delights. For example, you might expect to read Updike on Fitzgerald, Carver, or Nabokov (which are just a few among those dealing with authors), but his brief piece on Kierkegaard offers a slit window into the author's spiritual side. Almost 150 pages of reviews and meditations on art exhibitions and artists further speaks to his wide interests. Several previously uncollected poems similarly delight, as does a section titled "Pet Topics" which includes considerations on subjects ranging from Albert Einstein, to dinosaurs, to Updike's devotion to golf. Added into this thrilling mix are talks on varied topics (one on humor in fiction stands out as particularly fine), as well as Updike's introductions to some later editions of his own work.

As often as not, when volumes such as this appear after a great writer death, one receives a hastily collected hodgepodge of works of varying quality and importance. Christopher Carduff, the editor of this book, is therefore deserving of much praise for creating something which Updike lovers will surely treasure.... Instead of reading it in one sitting, consider imbibing these pieces a little bit at a time; give yourself a chance to savor the unique genius that was John Updike. Read more ›

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Worth it for this sentence alone December 25, 2011

By John Colapinto

Format:Hardcover

From a review of The Defense:

"And indeed this novel, Nabokov's third, shows him--after the youthful and wistful novella Mary and the rather bleak manipulations of King, Queen, Knave--entering into his full poetic birthright, that vision which violently combines an ardent nostalgia with an aloof ingenuity, a pale fire of the intellect with an appetite for particulars so fierce and intimate that nearly every sentence has a twist of extra animation."

And there's plenty more of such miracles of observation and expression in the book's 480 pages. Read it and weep.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars an honorable mention April 26, 2013

By Case Quarter VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Higher Gossip joins john updike's other volumes of essays and reviews in my collection of books, as one among the others I'll open when interested in his opinion on an author, when i'm in the mood to spend time perusing the works of an artist seen and discussed by mr updike in an article, or when i'm just looking to pick up a piece of good prose to read.

in his Forward to The Early Stories: 1953 - 1975, found here, john updike wrote: A selection, surely, is best left to others, when the writer is no longer alive to obstruct the process.' i gratefully accept this suggestion as his invitation to read Higher Gossip not as a collection but as a selection of delights to be savored over time.

Updike did have plans for another volume of essays and criticism from work he collected in a three shirt boxes placed inside a carton which, after his death, arrived in book form as Higher Gossip under the editorship of christopher carduff. along with selections from the boxes, carduff tracked down fugitive pieces; in all, the writings here, including poems and a few short stories, span in years from a `comment solicited by the Times Literary Supplement' in 1964 to articles published in The National Geographic Magazine, one of them on dinosaurs, in 2007 and 2008.

nearly a third of the volume is comprised of writings on gallery art. two hundred and fifty pages of text discussing paintings, drawings, and photographs the majority of them not included here, is a lot to ask even the most ardent fan of updike and appreciator of art to make do with merely a few photos in black and white copy. no one should read the art pieces straight through; they are best enjoyed at leisure, with computer as companion piece to linger over the artist discussed while reading updike's text....

to the end, john updike continued homage to his influences, and , as a young man of the fifties, the authors of light verse, a form which had its heyday that decade, and the writers who graced, as did he, the pages of The New Yorker. also shared in print are his reponses to awards and tributes he received over the years, comments on his own works, and the vast array of reviews of books written by authors from around the globe.

the several golf essays contain some of his best writing, as with this description from Walking Insomnia: `Golf at its measured pace permits an electric excess of mental activity. Your brain pours a rain of advice down upon your body, like a seasoned old coach who is at first patient and fatherly with a dull-witted athlete, then louder and blunter in his sideline advice, and finally livid with frustration. Who could sleep in such a racket of inward stricture?' such a metaphor would be as easily at home in a work of fiction.

as a writer he measured his game against the greats. his career, thanks to The New Yorker, was a fortunate one; his high talent never lacked place to shine--a quintessential american writer, who began in the 1950s, brought what he admired, emulated, learned, and transmuted from foreign writers to places like his imaginary tarbox. he was ambitious, but ambitious with his delicious tongue in cheek self-consciousness which failed to hide a humility which over decades deepened into grace and fine manners; i believe he never really expected to better his precursors, and he didn't, the roster of greats remains intact, but that he wanted to find a place among them, so that when we talk about the literary game we might for a moment mention him as one on the playing field. Read more ›

5.0 out of 5 stars Beyond expectations January 27, 2013

By Robert Madero

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Updike is one of our finest writers. Particularly liked his short stories and poems. I recommend him to every reader.

5.0 out of 5 stars Updike, the consummate intellectual November 28, 2012

By Dominica

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I love John Updike's fiction, and I had just completed a wonderful collection of his short stories called "My Father's Tears." I find "Higher Gossip" to be a wonderful collection too, but the five stars I give it is due solely to Updike's genius as a writer and not on my comprehension as a reader. This collection of essays and criticism, interspersed with pieces of memoir, poetry, and fiction, was being assembled by Updike at the time of his death. One who is well-versed in literature and art will feel a kinship with this writing that perhaps the average reader, like myself, may lack. However, though I find some of the subject matter of this volume to be intimidating, I intend to forge ahead, hoping to assimilate some small piece of the vast banquet of erudition that John Updike sets before us. I started with his review of David Michaelis' biography of the cartoonist Charles Schulz, creator of the Peanuts cartoons, and then found the strength to move into less familiar territory. I'm glad that I purchased the book. It deserves slow and careful reading.