“ His gray suit makes him seem extra vulnerable, in the way of children placed in unaccustomed clothes for ceremonies they don't understand. John Updike
“ He imagines the plane exploding as it touches down, ignited by one of its glints, in a ball of red flame shadowed in black like you see on TV all the time, and he is shocked to find within himself, im… John Updike
“ Inside, upstairs, where the planes are met, the spaces are long and low and lined in tasteful felt gray like that cocky stewardess's cap and filled with the kind of music you become aware of only when… John Updike
“ On the single strand of wire strung to bring our house electricity, grackles and starlings neatly punctuated an invisible sentence. John Updike
“ He sounds to himself, saying this, like an impersonator; life, just as we first thought, is playing grownup. John Updike
“ Dabbling in the sandbox gives Rabbit a small headache. Over at the pavilion the rubber thump of Roofball and the click of checkers call to his memory, and the forgotten smell of that narrow plastic ri… John Updike
“ He lost his appetite for reading. He was afraid of being overwhelmed again. In mystery novels people died like dolls being discarded; in science fiction enormities of space and time conspired to crush… John Updike
“ A company of believers is like a prison full of criminals; their intimacy and solidarity is based on what they can least justify about themselves. John Updike
“ From infancy on, we are all spies; the shame is not this but that the secrets to be discovered are so paltry and few. John Updike
“ The voice welling up out of this little man is terrific, Harry had noticed it at the house, but here, in the nearly empty church, echoing off the walnut knobs and memorial plaques and high arched raft… John Updike
“ The difficulty with humorists is that they will mix what they believe with what they don’t—whichever seems likelier to win an effect. John Updike
“ The first breath of adultery is the freest after it, constraints aping marriage develop. John Updike
“ Harry has heard this before. Thelma's voice is dutiful and deliberately calm, issuing small family talk when both know that what she wants to discuss is her old issue, that flared up a minute ago, of… John Updike
“ He settles back with a small handful of cashews; dry-roasted, they have a little acid sting to them, the tang of poison that he likes. John Updike
“ Lucas felt uncommonly depressed and careless. Drunkenness, in a man like August Hay, melts the restraints on cheerfulness. On the contrary with Lucas: he kept up courage consciously. Sap his mind, and… John Updike
“ The mind cannot fall asleep as long as it watches itself. Only when the mind moves unwatched and becomes absorbed in images that tug it as it were to one side does self-consciousness dissolve and slee… John Updike
