John Updike, the prolific Pulitzer Prize-winning author for fiction novels capturing the mood and emotions of small-town, middle-class America, passed away on Tuesday at 76.

The great writer who lived for more than half a century in Beverly Farms, Massachusetts, was kneeled by lung cancer in a hospice and his death was announced by his publisher, Nicholas Latimer of Alfred A. Knopf.

 

In a poem due to be published later this year Updike mused about his so-called retirement being received with "a shrug and tearless eyes." The poem called "Requiem," will be published this year in the Updike’s forthcoming collection "Endpoint" in September, collection which Latimer received just a few weeks ago. Two more books of the same author, "My Father's Tears and Other Stories" and "The Maple Stories" are expected to share the same fate, one in June and the other in August.

 

Updike’s novels, short stories and poetry were exposed in more than 50 books throughout his career, praised by some critics and minimized by others throughout his half a century long career. In recent years, he dedicated his genius in writing art criticism and essays.

 

Robert Silvers, editor of the New York Review of Books, who published much of Updike’s art criticism, stated for The Times on Tuesday that the writer had a remarkably wide range of literary interests which were never superficially or casually treated. Moreover, Silvers considered Updike one of the most brilliant and talented art critics.

 

In addition to his two Pulitzers, for "Rabbit Is Rich" and "Rabbit at Rest," the writer also won the American Book Award and the National Book Award for "Rabbit Is Rich."

"Writing makes you more human" – John Updike.