John Updike (1932 — 2009)
Shillington, Berks County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
Two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and one of America’s most noted authors, Updike lived here until age thirteen. He was inspired by his mother, an amateur writer, and his childhood surroundings, which he included in many works over his 50-year career. Best known for his “Rabbit” quartet of novels, Updike was also acclaimed for his short stories and essays. He was honored by two US presidents for his contributions to American literature and culture.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
John Updike spent his first thirteen years in Shillington, and the small-town Pennsylvania world of his childhood — along with the encouragement of his mother, herself an amateur writer — shaped the sensibility that made him one of America's most celebrated authors. Over a 50-year career he won two Pulitzer Prizes and earned acclaim for his short stories and essays as well as his fiction. He is best remembered for the "Rabbit" quartet, which followed an ordinary American man across four decades of national change.
Why it matters
Updike chronicled middle-class American life with rare precision, and his boyhood in this Berks County town became the wellspring for a body of work honored at the highest levels of the nation's cultural life.
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