Rabbit Run

As I read Rabbit Run by John Updike over the weekend, I was reminded of a similar week 13 years ago when I completed Gone With The Wind in 3 days straight. Like Rabbit Run, I picked up Gone With The Wind many times, only to be dissuaded by the details of the party Scarlet had to attend, once I got over the tedium of the first 50 pages there was no stopping me. Scarlet and her tale fascinated me at so many levels. Inadvertently Scarlet aroused empathy, intrigue and admiration. Her cry for “I shall never be hungry again” resonated strongly, the realization that the American nation had changed for ever at so many socio economic and political levels after the Civil War while searching for parallels closer home took me back to the book many many times. The similarity with Rabbit Run, once I got over the tedium of the first 40 pages where Rabbit plans and fails to run away from his family, the book gripped me and I finished in a day and half flat.
Rabbit Run is the first of the series by Pulitzer Prize winning author John Updike and often considered to be the best in the Rabbit series. The protagonist is Harry” Rabbit” Angstrom, the quintessential Peter Pan, married with a child and a semi responsible job, steadfastedly refusing to grow up. The backdrop of Rabbit’s struggle is the dark underbelly of small town America, often the tedium of life in the small town adding to Rabbit’s real or imaginary woes. The book covers 5 months in the life of Rabbit, his family and his mistress and is quite limited in its field of vision both in terms of time and the landscape. What makes the book a page turner is one the intrigue the author manages to create through crafty situations and perceptive dialogue, of what shall happen next to Rabbit and his life that he specializes in messing up. More importantly it is the insight with which the author captures the struggles of the quintessential modern day American Peter Pan. 26 year old Harry Angstrom refers to himself by his childhood nickname Rabbit, symbolic of his yearning to get back to the high school basketball court probably the only place he ever aced at. Rabbit is out of sorts in the grown up world, never quite knowing what he wanted his life to be but sure he hates what it is now. Updike through a collage of conversations, insights and reminisces explores the angst that Rabbit goes through trying to be a father, husband to alcoholic (and pregnant) Janice and responsible employee when all he would rather do is shoot hoops at the court, the angst that finally forces him to run out on his family and seek refuge in a hurried (but seemingly) happy affair. One such conversation is my aha moment in this book where Rabbit says, “When you have been best at something, being second best is just not good enough”. The world from Rabbit’s vantage point does seem unfair and the author manages to not make you hate Rabbit for his juvenile longings and irresponsible running away. You regale a bit as he enjoys the simple things that life has to offer with his new found mistress however the tables turn as soon as there are signs of distress and Rabbit confused again chooses the path of least resistance.
What John Updike manages to create through the mastery of his craft is a mélange of characters in Rabbit’s life who project a quality Rabbit himself does not possess.
So in his alcoholic wife Janice rabbit sees probably the personification of all the seven deadly sins, she is sloth, greed, lust and all the evil that emotionally stunted rabbit can perceive. He loves to hate her, so much so that when Janice puts her best foot forward to reform he pushes her to the same bad habits he hates her for. His coach Marty Jo manifests for him the desire to win which he once could and the desire to inspire which he knows he fails miserably at. His mistress Ruth in an obvious paradox is the prostitute who for him represents the good and pure life. The preacher is his voice of conscious, his connection to God, which for most part is absent, only surfacing to add to his already prolific confusions. Through the maze of all these people who pull him in different directions, Rabbit aimlessly wanders from crisis to crisis.
I enjoyed reading Rabbit Run, what works for the book is the insightful journey through small town America, the firm etching of characters through master strokes of conversations, reactions and incidents where not even a word seems wasteful. However having said that will I ever get back to it or will I ever attempt to read the sequels, I am not to sure about that. And that is why the book does not work for me completely. It fails to create empathy or sympathy for Rabbit. Rabbit does not evoke pity, interest or even sufficient anger. As the book ends you are just a trifle irritated with Rabbit and his juvenile search for the proverbial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. And when his coach asks him “Does it even exist”. . you tend to agree.