Rabbit, Run [Paperback]

John Updike (Author)

Book Description

Release date: August 27, 1996

Rabbit, Run is the book that established John Updike as one of the major American novelists of his—or any other—generation. Its hero is Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom, a onetime high-school basketball star who on an impulse deserts his wife and son. He is twenty-six years old, a man-child caught in a struggle between instinct and thought, self and society, sexual gratification and family duty—even, in a sense, human hard-heartedness and divine Grace. Though his flight from home traces a zigzag of evasion, he holds to the faith that he is on the right path, an invisible line toward his own salvation as straight as a ruler’s edge.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Brilliant and poignant . . . By his compassion, clarity of insight, and crystal-bright prose, [John Updike] makes Rabbit’s sorrow his and our own.”—The Washington Post
 
“The power of the novel comes from a sense, not absolutely unworthy of Thomas Hardy, that the universe hangs over our fates like a great sullen hopeless sky. There is real pain in the book, and a touch of awe.”—Norman Mailer, Esquire
 
“A lacerating story of loss and of seeking, written in prose that is charged with emotion but is always held under impeccable control.”—Kansas City Star

From the Publisher

I read Rabbit, Run when I was in high school (and it wasn't even a school assignment!). Twenty years later (at least!), three very vivid scenes from that book still pop into my head from time to time. The first is the used-car lot, where Rabbit Angstrom, the former basketball star, works for his father-in-law. The second scene is in a very red Chinese restaurant that had changed over from a French restaurant only the week before. Rabbit is there with his old coach and two women that are not their wives, and they drink daiquiris and whiskey sours. This restaurant could have been (and was) in my small town. The third scene is the most harrowing, and I've repeated it as a cautionary tale to young mothers for years, telling the story as if it had happened to someone I know. Janice, Rabbit's wife, who slugs alcohol throughout her pregnancy, is drunk and bathing her newborn baby when something terrible happens. I won't ruin it by telling you more. I read hundreds of books a year, both for my job and for pleasure, so the fact that parts of this book are so indelibly etched in my mind is a testament to the talent and genius of John Updike.
P.S. all of the other books in the Rabbit series are equally unforgettable.
--Maureen O'Neal --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks; Reissue edition (August 27, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0449911659
• ISBN-13: 978-0449911655
• Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 0.7 x 8.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (164 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #23,577 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

124 of 135 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Anti-Hero Trapped in Unhappy Marriage? Run! January 16, 2005

By Antoinette Klein TOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:Paperback

Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom was a high school superstar only a handful of years ago. Now he is a young married father, trapped in the suburban 60's, unhappy with a cluttered house, a drunken wife, and a son who will never be the athlete he was. Will this former basketball star find a way to make his life better, or will he run like a rabbit? The title says it all and Harry Angstrom does indeed run whenever things don't go his way.

Leaving the house to pick up his son, he impulsively drives from his Pennsylvania home to West Viriginia. He wants to run to the sunny shores of Florida to live the life he feels he deserves. Surely a man like Rabbit deserves more in life, or so he imagines. Unable to complete this journey, he runs to his former coach, a tired and washed-up man who introduces him to a part-time prostitute. Rabbit moves in with Ruth that very night and they begin a relationship they flaunt and thus humiliate his very pregnant wife and both sets of parents.

Is there an ounce of unselfishness in Rabbit? The reader may think so when he returns to his wife the night she goes into labor. Their reunion is bittersweet and because in large part of Rabbit's inability to see beyond his own needs, their reunion burst apart in a senseless tragedy that is horrific but so beautifully written the reader is glued to the page hoping against hope this terrible thing is not happening.

Will Rabbit be able to grow up and realize he is no longer the high school hero? Will he be able to comfort his wife, to provide a home for her and his children? Will he forsake Ruth, the hooker who accepts him as he is but is now pregnant with his child? In which direction will Rabbit run this time?

In addition to the novel's main character, Updike gives us as fine an array of secondary characters as can be found anywhere. He elevates Janice and Ruth so that they are not stereotypical "bad wife" and "good-time girl" but sympathetic characters the reader can relate to. Most notable among the secondary characters is the minister, Jack Eccles, who takes upon himself the task of saving Rabbit. He becomes Rabbit's friend and marvels at the paradox of this character. For example, after spending the first night with Ruth, Rabbit has the need to go home and get clean clothes as he cannot function unless his wardrobe is clean and pressed. The minister inquires, "Why cling to that decency if trampling on the others is so easy?" Thus lies the paradox of this restless anti-hero, one the reader cannot admire but cannot help but root for and not turn away from. It is this same minister who so succintly sums up the essence of Rabbit when he lambasts him later by saying, "The truth is you're monstrously selfish. You're a coward. You don't care about right or wrong; you worship nothing except your own worst instincts." And therein lies the crux of Rabbit's character.

The novel's second half is quite intense and on finishing it there is no way I could leave Rabbit and the supporting characters behind. I had to know what happened, so immediately began the sequel RABBIT REDUX, the second in the four-part Rabbit series. I admit that had I read this when it was first published I would have been let-down by the ending since I like tidy conclusions. Waiting 11 years to find out what happened to Rabbit would have been an eternity. I could barely wait 11 seconds, so I'm glad I discovered these books and Updike only recently.

45 of 47 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars I hated it so much I read the sequels June 6, 2006

By Douglas S. Wood VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

This is a Great Book - it must be - the NYT and other literary experts say so. Rabbit's life is awful - his wife's a drunk, his job sucks, nothing is really what he thought life would be. He tries to run away and fails at that too. According to Time magazine, Rabbit Angstrom is "an unflinchingly authentic specimen of American manhood". Yikes! Let's hope not - but maybe there is more truth in it than one likes to admit.

It's hard not to recommend reading this book even though reading it is really not an enjoyable experience. Rabbit evoked powerful emotions in this reader - especially anger and depression; maybe a little anxiety. You are almost guaranteed to feel worse after you read this book - especially if you can identify with any part Angstrom's angst. On the other hand, the mature reader (er, middle-aged) who has experienced the fullness of life's sorrows may sort of shrug at Rabbit as if to say 'what did you expect from life? Pull yourself together, son.'

Read at your own risk.

38 of 43 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The first - a burst of intensity April 11, 2005

By Michael Battaglia

Format:Paperback

I always find it interesting that in a lot of extended series of novels, the first book tends to be compact and to the point, while later novels tend to be more sprawling and expanded. Glancing over my line of Updike's Rabbit novels, of which this is the first, that seems to be the case, but time will tell whether those later books successfully trade the taut intensity of this novel for a more spacious feel. The Rabbit novels take up four books, all tracing the life of Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom, a man growing up in the latter part of the twentieth century, with each book taking place in a different decade, highlighting not only the changes in Harry but the changes in the country itself as it winds through the crazy years of the 1900's. This book takes place in the early fifties or late sixties and introduces us to the man himself, Rabbit, who does his best to fulfill the verb embedded in the title and run as far as he can. Harry feels trapped in his marriage, with a three year old already present and his wife heavily pregnant and drinking all the time, he takes a look at his dreary life and wigs out, trying to drive as far away as he can before coming back and attempting to find himself, with increasingly flailing results. His quests lead him to encounter a priest, a prostitute, an old coach and his parents and in-laws, all of whom have advice and none of which seem to have the right advice. So Harry tries to forge his own way but that might not be right either. The book doesn't have so much of a plot as it consists of shifting stream of consciousness impressions, all told with Updike's carefully controlled prose, lunging from beautiful descriptions of the outside world and the people in it to searingly brutal internal monologues that are only matched by the terrible things people say to each other. There's hardly a likeable character in the entire novel and that's where the real truimph comes in because even when you have all these imperfect people you keep reading anyway, watching them trying to find meaning in their grey lives, with nobody really sure what to do. And in the center of it all runs Rabbit, serving to cause everything even as he's only reacting against what's happening to him. People throw the word "anti-hero" around when describing him and it's not too far off, he's selfish and hypocritical and impulsive and utterly self centered but yet there's a fascinating sincerity about him, a tragic sense that he's certain he's doing the right thing even as he brings it crumbling down even further. None of the characters are angelic, all hide their own motives and quirks and it only makes them more sympathetic because they're dealt flawed cards to begin with and sometimes in trying to make the best of it they only muck things up further. The latter half of the book is remarkably intense considering it's about suburban life and the pivotal moment goes by like a slow motion car wreck, a horror far worse than anything Stephen King ever crafted unfolding before you. You know what's going to happen about halfway through and you keep reading in the hopes that your intuition isn't true. Updike's words masterfully give voice to the numbness inside all of them and even if he's wordier than he should be at moments it doesn't matter because the sheer tide of his telling carries us through. The book depicts people who are alternatively saints and monsters and really none and so fall somewhere in between, just like any of us. Rabbit runs, but it gets him nowhere and with a character this rich, readers have to know that we'll eventually see what happens beyond the ending. And yes there are three more books. But even if you can only read one, this is enough. That there's three more waiting is just an afterthought, a way to see what happens in the movie after the credits stop rolling and everyone else has gone home. Regardless of anything else, here's where it starts.