RaveThe AtlanticUpdike’s letters could constitute the outline for a never-published Updike novel. The writing is variously winking, earnest, desperate, oversexed, and ambitious ... Updike is, as ever, captivating on the page ... His letters to Mary in this era are silly, intimate, and affectionate—bittersweet to read now, with the knowledge that their relationship was doomed ... John Updike was a writer, one of the all-time greats. That’s all he ever wanted to be. But first, and forever, as Selected Letters makes clear again and again, he was a reader.
