ESTRUP ARTS BLOG

Erica Jong – Language matters

“Language matters because whoever controls the words controls the conversation, because whoever controls the conversation controls the outcome, because whoever frames the debate has already won it; because telling the truth has become harder and harder to achieve in an America drowning in Orwellian Newspeak.” Erica Jong Seducing the Demon

Add comment January 29th, 2009

John Updike

Prolific US author John Updike dead at 76
41 mins ago AFP/File – Pulitzer Prize-winning author

NEW YORK (AFP) – Prolific Pulitzer Prize-winning US novelist John Updike, whose books and short stories chronicled small-town American life, has died at age 76, his publisher Knopf said.

“It is with great sadness that I report that John Updike died this morning at the age of 76, after a battle with lung cancer,” Knopf publicity director Nicholas Latimer said in a statement.

Over a career spanning more than half a century, Updike published at least a dozen short story collections and 25 novels.

His most famous books were in the Rabbit series, including “Rabbit, Run” and “Rabbit Redux.” He also wrote hundreds of short stories, poetry, literary criticism and reviews in The New Yorker magazine.

“He was one of our greatest writers and he will be sorely missed,” Latimer said.

The Washington-based Academy of Achievement described Updike as “one of America’s premier men of letters.”

Updike recounted how a sickly childhood on a farm in Pennsylvania prepared him for a cerebral life.

“He suffered from psoriasis and a stammer, ailments that set him apart from his peers. He found solace in writing, and won a scholarship to Harvard,” the Academy of Achievement noted.

Updike went on to edit the famous Lampoon humor magazine at Harvard and then published a poem and fiction in the New Yorker soon after graduating.

“My mother had dreams of being a writer and I used to see her type in the front room. The front room is also where I would go when I was sick so I would sit there and watch her,” Updike said.

Add comment January 27th, 2009

Barefoot Girl Out of Ohio – a memoir of survival and overcoming

5 Stars

Betrayed by the relatives that should have protected her – parents, grandparents,
and uncle – she turned to art and music to survive. Though she struggled to escape
her nightmare existence, the wounds inflicted on her drew her on a self-destructive
path. One marriage to an abusive artist led to mental collapse and divorce; another
marriage to a sadistic cult leader ended only after he threatened to kill her and her
children.

At last she found a steadfast husband, but the trauma she had coped with all her
life left her with devastating anxiety and depression. In the safety of a remote
dwelling in the mountains, she at last had to face herself, and the childhood stolen
from her. A profound and inspirational story of the struggle to overcome a legacy of
personal suffering.

Click here to read a sample or buy this book.

A profound and inspirational story of the struggle to overcome
a legacy of personal suffering.

Add comment December 7th, 2008