This is an excellent portrait of a young (twenties) man who is confused about his place in the world, as perhaps most young men are. He is trying to sort out his relationship with his wife, his child, his parents, and another woman. He doesn't have much awareness of how these people might feel, and focuses instead on his own feelings, which is not a great recipe for relationship success. Indeed, the running Rabbit ends up doing is running from all his relationships. The relationship which seems to offer most hope to Rabbit is the one he has with 'his' pastor, who loves Rabbit despite his obvious faults and sins. No one understands this love and even the pastor himself has doubts.
Rabbit isn't an attractive person but we're drawn into his life with a sort of morbid fascination, not unlike the way we stare at car accidents and other human tragedies.
Rabbit is a lousy husband, father, son, and lover. It's somewhat depressing to see myself in him, but that's the point, isn't it?
I'll be putting the remainder of the "Rabbit" series on my 'to read' list to see how Updike allows Rabbit to change as he ages and/or matures. Is there any hope in the world? At this point the answer seems to be 'no'. ( )

“Rabbit, Run” is the first of four “Rabbit” novels by John Updike. In all four novels, (”Rabbit, Run”, “Rabbit, Redux”, “Rabbit is Rich”, “Rabbit at Rest”), the main character is Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom.

“Rabbit, Run” was published in 1960 and therefore, this book marks the 1950s era. The 1950s was a very straight-laced time, so I can only imagine how shocking “Rabbit, Run” must have been at that time (it has been banned and/or challenged in the past).

Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom is 26 years old. He married “relatively late” at the age of 23, to Janice, three years his junior. At the start of the novel, he has a dead-end job selling vegetable peelers. Rabbit and Janice have a toddler with a second baby on the way. Janice is quite the heavy drinker; drinking even when she is late in her pregnancy. Rabbit feels how sordid his life is — feels that Janice is losing her looks already and unpleasant to be around – so he ”runs away” (the title of the book reflects this theme). When he does, he meets a woman, Ruth, with a less than ideal background; and he immediately moves in with her.

After about two months, Rabbit leaves Ruth for his wife (when she gives birth to their baby). Soon after , when tragedy strikes in the family, he runs back to Ruth again. The end of the book leaves in question who Rabbit will commit himself to. The phrase “commitment-phobe” was probably not around in the 1950s, but certainly applies to Rabbit; at least during this period of his life.

There is much that happens in this book in between that I do not cover here, in order not to completely give away the plot. Even though Rabbit is only 26 years old, he seems to be already going through a mid-life crisis. Maybe because people tended to marry young back in the 1950s.

There are some sexual scenes in this book; which I am sure were considered scandalous during the 50s, but probably seem relatively mild today.

Some people might think, “gosh, I can see why this book has been banned; and gee, Rabbit is such a jerk. Who would want to read three more books about him?” Yet, I want to read the next book in the series! Why is that?

It’s because of the amazing writing by John Updike (at the time of this review, this book is the first Updike I’ve ever read). Also, the storyline moves along at a good pace, and never bogs down. It took me only a couple days, really, to read this book. There are so many parts I’d like to quote. Where do I start?!

When Rabbit has left Janice, he drives away from their home (a fictional town near Philadelphia) and at one point he stops at a roadside cave in West Virginia at midnight for a coffee:

“…he is unlike the other customers. They sense it too, and look at him with hard eyes, eyes like little metal studs pinned into the white faces of young men sitting in zippered jackets in booths three to a girl, the girls with orange hair hanging like wiggly seaweed or loosely bound with gold barrettes like pirate treasure. At the counter middle-aged couples in overcoats bunch their faces forward into the straws of gray ice-cream sodas. In the hush his entrance creates, the excessive courtesy the weary woman behind the counter shows him amplifies his strangeness. He orders coffee quietly and studies the rim of the cup to steady the sliding in his stomach. He had thought, he had read, that from shore to shore all America was the same. He wonders, Is it just these people I’m outside or is it all America?”

Later on, in a different restaurant– a Chinese restaurant– where he meets his soon-to-be mistress – they request to have the silverware taken away, so that they can use chopsticks:

“The waiter goes away like a bridesmaid with his bouquet of unwanted silver”.

Here is one of a few passages that might be why “Rabbit, Run” has been banned and/or challenged:

“Cupping a hand behind her hot sheltered neck, he pulls her up, and slides her slip over her head. It comes off with liquid ease. Clothes just fall from a woman who wants to be stripped. The cool hollow his hand finds in the small of her back mixes in his mind with the shallow shadows of the stretch of skin that slopes from the bones of her shoulders. He kisses this expanse. Where her skin is whiter it is cooler”.

Rabbit seems to be a man who is only able to live in the moment. He thinks he is in love with his mistress Ruth, and tells her he’ll be with her forever, but leaves her when his wife has her baby. When tragedy strikes in Rabbit’s reunited family, Rabbit goes back to Ruth, but again finds himself running away yet again.

The next book, “Rabbit Redux” was published some time later, during the Vietnam era. The Rabbit book series reflect each subsequent decade of Rabbit’s life; so I’d like to eventually read all of them so that I can see what kind of life, and person, Rabbit grows into. ( )

This book reinforces the negative stereotype of human males as being selfish sex-crazed narcissists who possess no feelings of empathy or loyalty for their female companions. The main character demonstrates the ultimate in immaturity and lack of responsible behavior. The women in the story show plenty of immaturity also, but since I'm male I'll remain politically correct and confine myself to criticism of the male behavior. Since the book follows a guy who is preoccupied with sex it follows that it is filled with descriptions of sexual encounters that are way too explicit for me.

So is there any social redeeming value to this book? John Updike certainly has a way with words. (See quotation below.) I suspect that the story being told is actually a pretty realistic description of the lives of some people. The story contains a tragedy near the end that adds some poignancy to the plot and provides sufficient heft to the novel to allow it to be called a classic literary novel. Overall this book is a portrait of a young man running away from any personal relationship that might require some responsibility and loyalty on his part. Therefore, the nickname Rabbit is an appropriately descriptive tag for this character.

The following is an example of John Updike's writing where he describes a vivid picture using less than the proverbial thousand words:

"A woman once of some height, she is bent small, and the lingering strands of black look dirty in her white hair. She carries a cane, but in forgetfulness, perhaps, hangs it over her forearm and totters along with it dangling loose like an outlandish bracelet. Her method of gripping her gardener is this: he crooks his right arm, pointing his elbow toward her shoulder, and she shakily brings her left forearm up within his and bears down heavily on his wrist with her lumpish freckled fingers. Her hold is like that of a vine to a wall; one good pull will destroy it, but otherwise it will survive all weathers."

One curious observation about the character Rabbit is that he doesn't smoke or drink, at least not very much. I usually assume anybody with such blatant lack of integrity to be a chain smoking alcoholic. John Updike provides a believable exception to that sort of stereotype. ( )

The story revolves around Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom, a twenty-six-year-old. He was a big basketball star back in high school but now he is married, sells vegetable peelers, and has a second child on the way. And he's unhappy. But it doesn't come right out and tell you he's unhappy.

He's on his way home from work when he sees a bunch of kids playing basketball. He joins in and pretty much womps them. And he goes home and his wife is drinking and smoking (see...the differences between then and now?). And he's annoyed at her and that she's drinking. Oh, he's not annoyed because drinking is bad for the baby...no...it's because he's quit and she hasn't. So when he has to go pick up the car and she askes him to pick up a packet of cigarrets on his way home...he just leaves and doesn't come back.

At first he tries driving to Florida. But somehow that doesn't work. He ends up in a nearby town and hooks up with another lady and starts living with her. And he's really conceited. And it's all just a muddled mess.

And that's all I'm going to tell you. There is a part toward the end that is just shocking. Watch out because you might tear up on the subway, or miss your stop, or slack off responsibilities because you have to read it to the end then.

What we all agreed on is that the story just sucked us in. And Rabbit wasn't a very like-able character. But then again he wasn't supposed to be. We still all agreed that even we didn't know why we still cared about what was going to happen when really NONE of the characters were really like-able. But maybe that's the point. We get flawed characters because really none of us are perfect. And who doesn't know of a person like Rabbit.

I'm definitely going to read the other books in the series. ( )

What a surprise in 2009...NOT! To read a book about a selfish,immature,self-involved hypercritical of woman 26 year old man! I guess we have learned a thing or two in the last 40 years and that is that most men/boys are certainly not ready for all the responsibilities of work,marriage and children in their mid 20's I speak with some authority as I have a 23 year old son and did not meet my now husband until I was 30. Rabbit is so typical of all the frog princes I met in the dating years from 16 to 30! Maybe it was expecting too much in 1956 when this novel takes place. A big yuck on my part!