RABBIT REDUX (Mass Market Paperback)

To put my reaction into a sort of context, I walked out of the movie Leaving Las Vegas, or whatever it was called, because it was simply too morbid for me. These sad sack addictive personalities drive me nuts. I can't sit there and watch them destroy themselves. I'd greatly prefer that they killed themselves quickly and left me alone. I do not enjoy wallowing in garbage. I do not sympathize with self destructive morons. I can't help them, and I don't want to suffer with them.

This book features a weak young girl named Jill who allows herself to be destroyed by a nut case named Skeeter. Skeeter has some very valid points to make about American history, but he's not much of a house guest. I can't say I learned anything of value from Jill or Skeeter, so their sad sack story, their viciously morbid story, is pointless to me. Why suffer through it.

Rabbit just lets things happen to him and to the people around him. For a few moments he wakes up and exerts himself. He objects to Jill turning his son into a lying beggar on the street, and he goes so far as to smack her around. Then why doesn't he object to Skeeter turning Jill into a pathetic junkie? That seems quite a bit more serious. What is wrong with this idiot?

Another problem in the book is that Rabbit's wife Janice leaves her lover at the end, for no reason I can see. Her reason seems to be that the author told her to, after making it clear that she loves him desperately.

Judging from the more mature work, Rabbit At Rest, I thought John Updike was among the great writers of all time. Judging from this garbage, Rabbit Redux, I have modified my view. All I can do is shake my head and say to the author - what got into you?

The sixties have arrived and it caught Rabbit and his family by surprise. There is a brand new moral being followed, and he, as good as any product of his time, is caught by it, in spite of still being very attached to the fifties' way of thinking. But everything is about to change. Janice, Rabbit's wife, leaves him for a Greek colleague, and his mother is sick and dying. To make matters worse, the protagonist takes a young girl to live with him --and replace his wife--, while his mind is clouded with the troubles of his time, like Vietnam War and the man landing on the Moon.

But Rabbit's reeducation is about to begin. His new girlfriend brings along an African-American --but, of course, by that time nobody used this word-- called Skeeter who has some very extreme point of views. Actually most of what he thinks --if not everything -- is totally opposed to Rabbit's believes. Living in a constant fight these two men interact in such a way that will change both of them forever.

"Rabbit Redux" --just like the previous "Rabbit, Run"-- is more than a novel about the education of a man. Actually it is like a huge painting about North America in that period. Full of pop culture references -- early in the Rabbit family goes to the cinema to see "2001 - An Spacey Odyssey", for instance-- the book shows the environment in which the sexual revolution spread in USA, among other things. It is interesting to see how Rabbit's beliefs are so wrong and how they change throughout the narrative.

Just like in the first novel, John Updike is a gifted writer. Not only has he talent for developing characters in plausible situations, but he can also write sharp razor and witty dialogues. The words come to life from the paper when his creations are dialoguing. Another highlight of his writing is the eye he has for the times of change. The sixties were as crazy as he portrays in "Rabbit Redux". Those were time of radical change and the have a strong reflection in the Angstroms' lives.

I believe that Updike's work shares some resemblances with Philip Roth's. Both are important critics of North American society, but if for the second the society transforms the family institution, for the first the family is a reflection of its times and social transformation. And these two different approaches are very interesting, and can only increase the reader's critical sense.

All in all, Rabbit will again return in glory in the upcoming two novels, "Rabbit is Rich" and "Rabbit at Rest". And I can wait to read and find out what will come next to my favorite American anti-hero.