John Updike

Bob Dylan, authors voted into American Academy of Arts and Letters

2013-03-13 13:14:00

The traditionally staid American Academy of Arts and Letters is both charmed and flummoxed by Bob Dylan. The academy announced Wednesday that it voted the musician into its ranks -- its first rock musician ever. But he will be an honorary member: Not...

Ryan McIlvain's novel 'Elders' goes inside the Mormon faith

2013-03-12 15:01:00

During the 2012 presidential election, Republican candidate Mitt Romney's openness about his Mormon faith brought to the surface many of the generalizations Americans maintain about what it means to be a Mormon. Ryan McIlvain's debut novel "Elders"...

Evan S. Connell Jr. dies at 88; iconoclastic novelist, historian

2013-01-10 20:58:00

Evan S. Connell Jr., a literary iconoclast whose writings as a novelist, poet, essayist and historian won the admiration of critics and a cult-like following of discerning readers with books on subjects as eclectic as Midwestern provincialism, the...

The 2012 Bad Sex in Fiction Award goes to Nancy Huston

2012-12-04 16:21:00

England's most feared literary prize was announced Tuesday night -- "awarded" wouldn't be the right word, because the winning author was not in attendance. That was Nancy Huston, who took the 2012 Bad Sex in Fiction Award for her novel "Infrared." The...

Louis Simpson dies at 89; Pulitzer-winning poet

2012-09-23 00:00:00

"A poet," Louis Simpson once wrote, "should wish for enough unhappiness to keep him writing." Simpson may not have wished for trouble, but he kept writing for 60 years — spare, powerful poems about war, infidelity, suburban alienation and other...

Review: Jim Holt's compelling 'Why Does the World Exist?'

2012-07-08 00:00:00

-------------------- Why Does the World Exist? An Existential Detective Story Jim Holt Liveright: 310 pp., $27.95 -------------------- "How old is the Universe?" Kurt Vonnegut asked in his 1973 novel "Breakfast of Champions." "It is one half-second...

Review: 'The Way the World Works' maps Nicholson Baker's mind

2012-08-12 00:00:00

-------------------- The Way the World Works Essays Nicholson Baker Simon & Schuster: 319 pp., $25 -------------------- Nicholson Baker's new book, "The Way the World Works," is a miscellany: a collection of 34 essays originally published in...

John Updike's house to become a museum

2012-05-10 16:34:15

Horton Foote's children keep his plays alive

2012-01-15 00:00:00

Critic's Notebook: Grantland takes on the bigger world of sports

2012-01-04 00:00:00

When it comes to sportswriting, I tend to subscribe to George Plimpton's small-ball theory: The smaller the ball, the better the writing about the sport. This has a lot to do with my own biases (I'm a baseball fan, not much interest in basketball or...

The Far East Movement drop 'Bump from the Trunk Vol. 1'

2011-12-02 16:35:18

Take Grisham out to the ballgame

2012-01-18 16:35:15

The book: "DeLillo's fervent intelligence and his fastidious, edgy prose ... weave halos of import around every event .... The trouble with a tale where anything can happen is that somehow nothing happens.

2012-10-24 20:16:10

In Springfield: The second episode of the series to use digital ink and paint, which would become standard practice two seasons later.

2012-02-16 12:34:28

's novel about three women who find their lives turned upside down and mysterious personal powers unleashed when a devlish man moves to town, gets the network series treatment courtesy of ABC.

2009-06-11 11:47:26