Results tagged “lungcancer”

John Updike has died of lung cancer. He was 76. He was just in town in mid-November for a talk at Seattle Arts & Lectures that we attended and wrote about. It was our first and last time seeing him in person. We feel very lucky to have had that chance, now, and so we repeat what we said then: "He mentioned that the name Updike is what happens when the Dutch name 'Op de Dijk' hits American shores. Maybe that’ll be our updated image of this writer who has never lost his boyish enthusiasm for fiction’s impossible task. There he is, in front of his earthworks, holding back the sea—though the sea of course will inevitably win."