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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
An annotated bibliography of four critiques of Updike's Rabbit novels. Bibliography lists 4 sources.
Page Count:
4 pages (~225 words per page)
File: JL5_JL3rabb.rtf
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Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
in the Rabbit novels is invariable constrained by the conflict between skepticism and solace. He contends that Rabbits "instinct" towards skepticism is not rationally supported by the kind of intellectual
knowledge which obviates the need for spiritual consolation; in other words, Rabbits visceral feeling that virtue is internal, or innate, is not validated by intellectual, rational discourse. His attempts to
find personal fulfillment based entirely on individual actions and pursuits is not genuinely transcendent; if it were, Bailey argues, there would not be the sense of emptiness which is seen
in "Rabbit Remembered". In effect, Bailey is saying that Rabbits faith is dependent on the vagaries of time and experience; he might start out with a sense of affirmation and
transcendence, but this is not validated by his later experiences; more importantly, the intellectual aspect of rationality does not provide a viable alternative when affirmation is lost, since Rabbit himself
does not work within such a paradigm. Rabbits involvement with sport, for example, can be seen as a substitute for emotional and physical fulfillment, rather than an expression of it.
Sporting activity per se, even when it does not literally involve running, is a metaphor for a lack of spiritual stability in the individuals life. Morey-Gaines AJ
(1983) Religion and sexuality in Walker Percy, William Gass and John Updike: metaphors of embodiment in the androcentric imagination. Journal of the American Academy of Religion 51;4 595
Morey-Gaines focuses strongly on water imagery in Rabbit, and on the distinction between water as a metaphor of femininity and female power, and other elements as significant of
masculinity. She argues that the women in Updikes novels define their spirituality through the element of water, in that they are able to make easily the transition between flesh and
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