A Great Writer at Work

Sam Tanenhaus' New York Times article "John Updike’s Archive: A Great Writer at Work" offers an advance view of John Updike’s archives. Tanenhaus writes about how these documents reflect Updike’s writing process and his fierce dedication to find more and more precise ways [held to his own high standards] to portray what it was that he wanted to present to his readers. It is interesting to see the changes that came about as Updike worked and reworked his text.

In describing Updike's tenacity, Tenenhaus writes, "[an] Eagle Typing box contains a handwritten draft, completed in January 1989. Hurried on to the page (in pencil on the back of the typescript of a previous book), the flowing sentences are constellated with crossings out, insertions and circled text as Updike honed, phrase by phrase, the middle-American idiom and the hurtling present-tense that are signatures of the Rabbit cycle."

Here is an excerpt from the interactive feature of the Times article that shows the documents themselves and Updike's notations:

John Updike’s archive at Harvard’ s Houghton Library houses manuscripts and typescripts of many of his books and stories, including these three versions of the opening to his novel “Rabbit at Rest.” Written in pencil on the back of the typescript of a previous book and dated "1/22/89," the first draft shows Updike honing the idiomatic prose that is a signature of the Rabbit novels — for instance, crossing out “approached down three miles of divided highway” and replacing it with the more conversational and precise “you drive to it off Exit 21 of Federal 75.”

Updike’s handwritten scrawl at the top of the page reads: “plant fact that Ma. S left Janice her share of lot.” He is reminding himself to mention at the beginning of the novel that Rabbit’s wife, Janice, has inherited her mother’s stake in the family’s Toyota dealership.

Because the emendations to the first page were so numerous, Updike stapled a typed insert to the handwritten draft — and continued revising. He tightened the phrasing of the opening scene, which now begins in a Florida airport, and added an ingenious pun, “terminal,” that deepens the hero’s premonition of death.

In his final typescript, Updike worked in further refinements. After some indecision, he settled on the adverb “vaguely” (which he had replaced with “somehow” in the previous draft). The last sentence of the first paragraph is also more concise and idiomatic.

All of this reminds me that I must must make time each day to sit and write and to be patient with myself as I construct my own constellations, [phrase by phrase, if need be] that will guide me as I re-work and work on my own writing.

Take a look at the New York Times articles:

Annotations and Revision

John Updike’s Archive: A Great Writer at Work By SAM TANENHAUS