Three Trips: The Short-story Writer as Tourist

Pocket Penguin 70's #39

by John Updike

Genres: Fiction, Travel, Short Stories, American

56 pages, Paperback

First published May 6, 2005

About the author

John Hoyer Updike was an American writer. Updike's most famous work is his Rabbit series (Rabbit, Run; Rabbit Redux; Rabbit Is Rich; Rabbit At Rest; and Rabbit Remembered). Rabbit is Rich and Rabbit at Rest both won Pulitzer Prizes for Updike. Describing his subject as "the American small town, Protestant middle class," Updike is well known for his careful craftsmanship and prolific writing, having published 22 novels and more than a dozen short story collections as well as poetry, literary criticism and children's books. Hundreds of his stories, reviews, and poems have appeared in The New Yorker since the 1950s. His works often explore sex, faith, and death, and their inter-relationships.

He died of lung cancer at age 76.

Reviews

[Marcus Hobson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This little pocket Penguin edition came out in 2003. It has a sub-title of 'The Short-Story Writer as Tourist'.
The first two stories, featuring Nevada and Ethiopia, didn't do that much for me. The story of Nevada simply made me realise how little non-Americans know about America. References that were completely lost on me - I have no mental picture to draw on, no memory of the place to be awoken with a reference to colour or landscape.
The third story, "I Am Dying, Egypt, Dying" was much longer than the other two and allowed time for the story and characters to develop.
Several people are on a cruise along the Nile, stopping at temples mainly to be let ashore to explore. The travellers are from all around the world. The central character Clem is from Buffalo.
One night he joins three Egyptian traveller at the bar:

Clem sat there rigidly, immaculate in his embarrassment. Leila's green eyes, curious, pressed on him like gems scratching glass. The three Egyptians became overanimated, beginning sentences in one language and ending in another, and Clem understood that he was being laughed at. Yet the sensation, like the blurred clicking of the scarab salesmen, was better than untouched emptiness. He had another drink before dinner, the drink that was one too many, and when he went in to his single table, everything - the tablecloths, the little red lamps, the waiting droves of waiters in blue, the black windows beyond which the Nile glided - looked triumphant and glazed.

Updike does a masterful job at creating a sense of loneliness for this one passenger - talking to people yes, but never really making a connection until the very last night of the trip. It is a thirty page story in which very little happens but at the same time, so much goes unsaid. It doesn't need to be spelt out for us, we feel it through the discomfort of the characters. Their interactions and often their lack of connection.

[David Watson · Rating 4 out of 5]

John Updike seleted three of his favourite short stories, involving trips to exotic locations - well Egypt and Ethiopia are exotic, Nevada maybe not quite so much for American author Updike - for this tidy small-format Penguin edition, one of many in a series by famous authors. Having picked it up for $3 at a secondhand bookshop it was very good value at $1 per story for three engaging reads. A soon-to-be divorced dad mulling his life over while taking his daughters on a trip to Nevada and two other tales of Americans abroad all stick in the mind. I felt Updike captured the very exotic, off-the-mainstream-tourist-trail Ethiopia particularly well.

[Brašna · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is hard to point down what I think about this collection. I liked the first and the last story. The writing style is engaging and sometimes too truthful to the ways it goes on such trips. Perhaps a bit too common yet charming at the same time.

[Rebecca Cairo · Rating 1 out of 5]

Super Racist throughout and at times very weirdly homophobic. I have previously only read one Updike story and I wasn’t a fan, but I wanted to give him a second chance. I think his writing is just not for me at all.

[M●13RA · Rating 2 out of 5]

3.2/10

[Rojan Persephone · Rating 2 out of 5]

I did not fine the book interesting. It was like reading a short story written in a monthly magazine.

[Frances Rebollido · Rating 2 out of 5]

Why is this writing "good"?

[Muphyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really love the Pocket Penguin 70 Years collection, they give you such a nice taste of the author, either making you want more, or never wanting to read any of their stuff again.

Having never read anything of Updike before, I was quite impressed with this collection of three short stories. Apparently they're not even his best. I found his writing style elusive yet captivating, drawing me in. I especially liked the story I'm dying, Egypt, dying, set in the Middle East, where a group of people travel up the Nile. It has the smell of adventure, yet feels strangely detached. Leaves you wondering what's the matter with the main character. My kind of story.

[Dan Lalande · Rating 3 out of 5]

Back in 2003, Penguin celebrated its 70th anniversary with a nod to its origins: a series of quick reads, suitable for commuters, by brand-name authors. One of their best-selling Americans, John Updike, was invited to assemble three selections (collective length: 55 pages) from his vast catalog of short stories. In Nevada, Ethiopia, and across Egypt, Updike's heroes, each busy practicing a painterly eye, still manage to deal with his signature themes: infidelity, parenthood, and the value of American identity. You can take the boy out of smalltown Northeastern USA but...

[Maureen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first one was very good, I was drunk when I read the second one, and hungover when I read the third.

[Sophie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A wonderful taste of the Updike narrative ^_^

[Brian Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars!