Rabbit Run, published in 1960, established its author, John Updike, as a major American novelist. The novel tells the story of Harry ‘Rabbit’ Angstrom, a former high-school basketball star, who finds himself in his mid-twenties, marooned in a mundane marriage and a boring sales job. We follow him for three months as he struggles to transcend the limits of his life in Brewer, Pennsylvania – which in practical terms means leaving his pregnant wife, getting his girlfriend pregnant, going back to his wife after she has a baby, and facing eventual domestic tragedy, caused in part by his flaky carry on.

The book, while consisting of the most intimate and closely observed details of human behaviour, has a detached tone. We float above events, seeing them from the perspective of different characters, sometimes switching viewpoint over the space of a paragraph. Although this could be confusing, I did see it as fitting to the story. Harry tries to rise above ordinary life that drags on him. The narrative style reflects Harry’s aspiration. Maybe he would like to be an omniscient author, up above events, describing them in the present tense, like John Updike.

So is Harry’s quest valid, given all the hurt it causes? About half way through Rabbit Run, we get an example of a man who has actually succeeded in leaving the mundane aspects of life behind. Jack Eccles is a young priest who is trying to help Harry repair his marriage. Unsure of what to do, Eccles goes to his boss, Fritz Kruppenbach, for advice. The ‘advice’ Eccles receives is to leave tedious, worldly complications to work out for themselves. The job of Church ministers is not to involve themselves in the ridiculous business of parishioner’s lives, but to demonstrate faith, as it exists above humanity’s petty affairs. Kruppenbach is smug and aloof, only serving to demonstrate that standing above life is not attractive, not something that anyone would reasonably seek to achieve. Eccles storms out of the meeting and continues his best efforts to help Harry. And good for him, you think. Now, mundane details look different. This is where true meaning and compassion can be found. Incidentally, the name Eccles serves as a reference to Ecclesiastes, a story in the Old Testament, where the narrator famously declares that ‘all is vanity’ in human affairs, and people should enjoy the simple pleasures of daily life, which are a gift from God.

I think the book continues to be relevant today as a commentary on efforts, both ancient and modern, to rise above everyday concerns. Traditional methods are represented by the book’s various religious characters. In a more modern vein, I’ve read that Updike wrote Rabbit Run partly as a reaction to Kerouac’s On The Road, where self-involved young people drive around America, searching for themselves, with no thought for those they leave behind. Rabbit himself tries an ‘on the road’ escape early in the book, after walking out on his wife. He drives all night, gets lost, buys some fuel and ends up right back where he started the following morning.

Rabbit Run expresses a desire to transcend ordinary life, while also suggesting – in the manner of Ecclesiastes – that the only meaningful escape available to us lies in ordinary things. In the end Rabbit Run does not promise any kind of silly nirvana, but it does suggest a more liberating and interesting way of looking at the non-nirvana in which we spend our days.