Tiptoeing around Updike

 I've been a dedicated reader and reviewer of John Updike for probably 40 years and I'm still not eligible for Medicare. From "The Rabbits" to the literary criticism (he has just reviewed Toni Morrison's new one, "Mercy," in his usual carefully measured prose of disapproval), I've been entertained, informed and challenged.

I used to greet every new novel with anticipation, but as they continued to be disappointing -- "Villages," "Terrorist," "Seek My Face" -- I retreated to reading his growing collections of essays and memoirs while giving the fiction a wary eye.

Now, however, I'm faced with opening "The Widows of Eastwick." I got as far as the first page the other day before making an excuse to pick up something else, an L.L. Bean catalog, I think. My procrastination is growing because I've read just enough about it to convince myself it's skipable.

Updike's growing preoccupation with the body's physical decline comes to the fore here because his once sexy witches are "bag hags" whose puckered sagging flesh is put on display. No thanks. Snobbish dismissals of present-day families also occupy much of his view. Some of this was gleaned from Sam Tanenhaus' adolescent crush-gush that led the Times Book Review of 10/26 which he edits. So, when you're the editor of the nation's biggest newspaper book review, you can use the front page to run your own embarrassing love letter to John Updike and nobody can say, "Maybe tone it down or at least prove your contentions." Sam is also compiling a biography of William F. Buckley

Yet, a sense of duty impells me onward, puckered flesh and all. Maybe this weekend. Oh, I forgot. I have to rake leaves.

Some news: Rick Hilles won the $50,000 Whitting Writers Award for poetry this week. The University of Pittsburgh Press published his first collection, "Brother Salvage."