John Updike/Archibald Macleish

[Rich Goodale]

One of the interesting (to me) references from Updike's recent obituraries was the fact that when at Harvard he applied several times (but never successfully) to take Macleish's advanced writing course.  To maybe understand this failure, compare any of Updike's prose to the following poem of Macleish.  It is called Ars Poetica, but if you use your imagination you could think of it as Ars du Golf.....


Leaving, as the moon releases
Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,

Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves,
Memory by memory the mind -

A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs

A poem should be equal to:
Not true

For all the history of grief
An empty doorway and a maple leaf

For love
The leaning grasses and two lights above the sea -

A poem should not mean
But be

[TEPaul]

Goodale, why don't you at least TRY to make a point?? And if you can't do that do you think you can please remember that not everyone on here is smoking dope or taking LSD?

[Mark_F]

One of the interesting (to me) references from Updike's recent obituraries was the fact that when at Harvard he applied several times but never successfully to take Macleish's advanced writing course. 

Updike should be glad he never made the course.

That prose is more indecipherable than Radiohead's lyrics.  Maybe Thom Yorke succeeded where Updike failed?

[Rich Goodale]

One of the interesting (to me) references from Updike's recent obituraries was the fact that when at Harvard he applied several times but never successfully to take Macleish's advanced writing course. 

Updike should be glad he never made the course.

That prose is more indecipherable than Radiohead's lyrics.  Maybe Thom Yorke succeeded where Updike failed?

Mark

That's what you get when you post at 4am and cut but forget to paste.  It's corrected above.

[Rich Goodale]

Goodale, why don't you at least TRY to make a point?? And if you can't do that do you think you can please remember that not everyone on here is smoking dope or taking LSD?

Tom

All our posts should not mean, but be......

Rich

[Ronald Montesano]

1.  It's more verse than prose, given that there is a rhyme scheme;

2.  How does it apply to golf?  I have the soul of a poet (and the checkbook-balancing skills of one, too) yet simply don't see any connection.

3.  If Updike had the soul of a golfer but was rejected by Macleish, why should we attribute any golf bones to the latter?

[JMorgan]

There was an old geezer named Macleish,
Who kept all of his words on a leash;
He told jejune 'dike, Up yours take a hike,
That irascible man named Macleish.

[Rich Goodale]

Ronald

As it is a poem, it is verse....

To me, Updike was a writer who just happened to play golf.  Macleish, on the other hand was a poet who had a golfer inside his body, just waiting to be unleashed.

Slainte

Rich

[Bill_McBride]

There was an old geezer named Macleish,
Who kept all of his words on a leash;
He told jejune 'dike, Up yours take a hike,
That irascible man named Macleish.

There once was a man from Nantucket.....

Nice limerick there, J!

[BCrosby]

Great stuff John.

Updike got his. The New Yorker started publishing Updike while he was still an undergraduate. He went on to be the president of The Advocate, Harvard's literary magazine.

Bob

[John_Cullum]

Goodale, why don't you at least TRY to make a point?? And if you can't do that do you think you can please remember that not everyone on here is smoking dope or taking LSD?

Tom

All our posts should not mean, but be......

Rich

I am happy to hear that, as my posts rarely mean anything

[Peter Pallotta]

Rich - very nice.

Updike appeals to the head, Macleish to the heart
The poem like the golf course has space and freedom - the space enough to hold our vast and varied emotions, the freedom not to have those emotions prescribed or directed

Peter

[TEPaul]

I would appreciate it if one you literatis on here could solve a puzzlement for me. OR, if you can't you can just tell me I'm crazy for even mentioning something as preposterous as the following.

But it seems to me many years ago there was a character in one of Updike's book who was essentially a broken-down old book critic or something quite like that.

And then a number of years later Updike had another book come out that was reviewed in the New York Times Book Review section.

Who was the reviewer of Updike's book? It was that broken-down old book reviewer character in one of Updike's former books. Of course that broken-down old book reviewer was a fictional character, so......

Anyone on here remember that or could fill in some details?

PS:
The New York Times has managed to have a pretty good sense of humor over the years. I remember reading their obituary of President Anwar Sadat of Egypt. Throughout the obit it seemed to infer that Sadat really did have a lifelong aversion to English people and then just about in the last line the obit happened to mention that Sadat's wife was English!

[JMorgan]

Tom, I think you're referring to Henry Bech. 

[TEPaul]

Jmorgan:

That sounds exactly right----ie that rings a bell.