Updike’s Poetic Farewell

On a rainy Sunday, James Wolcott grabbed the New Yorker’s March 16 Style Issue and walked into Straus Park. He observes that upon reading John Updike’s poem, Endpoint, about battling lung cancer and approaching death, “everything else in the issue falls away.” “Don't read these poems online, should The New Yorker put them online," Wolcott continues. “Read them in the actual magazine, the tactility of holding the issue in your hands—the white shine of the pages, the elegance of the typeface, the sequencing of the poems—sealing the experience, preserving the dignified formality and moving finality of Updike's farewell mosaic, raindrops included.”