The first of a two part post on John Updike’s “Toward the End of Time” through the analysis of generic types.                                                                                                    

Persistently undervalued, except perhaps for his Rabbit novels, because he is regarded as covering up facile meaning with an engaging writing style, the quintessential New Yorker writer, John Updike deserves more appreciation, even in one of his lesser novels : Toward the End of Time”. But in order to appreciate the novel’s achievement, step back a few steps and consider the kind of book it is, which is what I call a deficient epic. Updike is very careful about what each of her novels are, whether the saga of “In the beauty of the lilies” or the polemical politics of “Terrorist” or “Couples” as the romantic serio-comedy.