Rabbit, Run: An Amazing Portrayal Of Reality

Rabbit, Run by John Updike is a true American classic. It portrays the life of Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom, an ex-highschool basketball player, who once had incredible athletic skills at the game, “got to the top” of his career, and “was famous through the country” (Updike, 6). But as the time passed, the ‘hero’ was forgotten and the average, ordinary person with the ordinary everyday problems and weaknesses emerged in his place. The life of Rabbit is much like a life of a real Rabbit. He runs away from all of his problems, literally. Rabbit has a few important turning points in his life, which affect not only him, but also lives of those who are close to him. These turning points are not his ‘fate’, but results of his character. While Rabbit used to be admired for his graceful basketball skills, he in reality is a weak and selfish character, who “doesn’t know, what to do, where to go, what will happen" (Updike, 264).

The start of Rabbit’s journey was very symbolic. Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom made a rather interesting appearance into the novel. A group of teenagers were playing a game of basketball in the street, and then, “a suddenly dark silhouette like a smokestack against the afternoon sky, setting his feet with care, wiggling the ball with nervousness in front of his chest, one widespread white hand on top of the ball, and the other underneath, jiggling it patiently to get some adjustment in air itself appeared” (Updike, 5). The ball drops in the circle of the rim. Rabbit came to life in this vivid display of his graceful moves, "He sinks shots one-handed, two-handed, underhanded, flat-footed, and out of the pivot, jump, and set. That his touch still lives in his hands elates him. He feels liberated from long gloom. But his body is weighty and his breath grows short” (Updike, 7). For a few seconds of the game, Rabbit feels himself free, strong and on “the top” again, but the reality of life is that he is “out”. These teenagers have not forgotten him: “worse, they never heard of him" (Updike, 7). And so, Rabbit starts running.

His first stop was his home, where Rabbit’s first major revelation comes at one simple thought about his alcoholic wife Janice. He realized that he doesn’t love her anymore, "She is a small woman whose skin tends toward olive and looks tight, as if something swelling inside is straining against her littleness. Just yesterday, it seems to him, she stopped being pretty" (Updike, 8). He had become very unhappy with Janice, and tried to find means of running away. He kept asking himself “What made her get that way? What was she afraid of?” (Updike, 9). But when Janice intuitively gave him the answer by asking, “Don’t run from me, Harry. I love you (Updike, 12). Harry was unable to accept the explanation that the reason is in him. Janice knew that he was running away from her and from their home. No matter what, Rabbit wanted to escape. The last straw was when he went over to his parent’s house, and there he saw them feeding his son Nelson food. It’s just all too much for him, “Harry’s boy is being fed, this home is happier than his” (Updike, 21). He can’t tolerate the thought that his parent’s house is a happier household than his. And so he runs. He runs on the road that reminds his life, "The road is broad and confident for miles, but there is a sudden patched stretch, and after that it climbs and narrows. Narrows not so much by plan as naturally, the edges crumbling in and the woods on either side crowding down. The road twists more and more wildly in its struggle to gain height and then without warning sheds its skin of asphalt and worms on in dirt. By now Rabbit knows this is not the road but he is afraid to stop the car to turn it around" (Updike, 33). Some critics also described their opinions on Rabbit’s drive out from Pennsylvania, “Many critics have identified Rabbit’s running as a religious quest, a search for meaning beyond the natural world” (Hennings, 22). The road is very symbolic. It shows the struggle that he faces at that point in the novel, but it also portrays the struggle of Rabbit’s life. His life is on a road, and there are so many turns to it. It would be so easy for him to just turn back at so many points in the novel, but he was reluctant to do so. As in his childhood, when he was afraid, he would go to “a far corner of the house” (Updike, 20). And now, running away, Harry as a real rabbit, is trying to find that quiet safe “corner” in his life.

The road that Rabbit eventually decided to take was one of immorals and adultery. It is the second turning point in Rabbit’s life. He felt that his road trip out of Pennsylvania was the only thing that pulled him out of his horrible life and into a new reality. His step into the immoral life was when he came to see his old basketball coach, Marty Tothero. In vain, Marty tried to explain to Rabbit that his escape “doesn’t sound like very mature behavior” (Updike, 38). In vain, he was trying to persuade Harry to think about Janice and not about himself. “Have you tried to help her? (Updike, 38). When Harry called Janice “dumb”, Marty was appalled. “That’s a harsh thing to say. Of any human soul” (Updike, 39). But finally, Marty gave in and introduced Rabbit to a new world of women, “What is it, yes, what is it? C*nt” (Updike, 43). The new woman in his life becomes a chubby woman named Ruth, a prostitute in Brewer. This is the biggest turn that he has taken in his life. However, sex was almost like a religion to Rabbit by then. In his mind, he thinks, “There was you and sometimes the ball and then the hole, the high perfect hole with its pretty skirt of net” (Hennings, 23). The first sexual encounter with Ruth was very powerful. This had happened when they went back to her apartment in Brewer, and Rabbit only wanted to have sex with her. The author was criticized for Rabbit’s detailed description of his sexual behavior, “As for the excessiveness of his prose, Updike does have a tendency to give his reader more description and detail that seems necessary, and often he destroys the emotional engagement of a scene by being too clever or funny” (Schiff, 9). Rabbit’s unique sexual tendencies have been portrayed vividly at different times at the story. In his relationship with Ruth, Rabbit was able to uncover his true emotions, “She keeps her arm tight against the one breast and brings up her hand to cover the other; a ring glints” (Updike, 71). The ring signifies commitment. Rabbit asked her to take it off, yet at the same time he wanted her to be his new wife. Rabbit turned this whole sexual encounter in something similar to a marriage. This was a turning point in his character, because he figured out that he wanted a commitment, but he simply couldn’t live with it. All he wanted to do was to have sex with many different women. He didn’t just look at Ruth, but he also wanted Reverend Eccle’s wife Lucy. It is such a large world out there, yet it is also a very small narrow place, and Rabbit is just terrified. And so, he keeps running. Thomas R. Edwards, a critic, stated that, “In Rabbit, Run, Harry, in full flight from the entangling demands of domestic life, thinks ‘he doesn’t know, what to do, where to go, what will happen, the thought that he doesn’t know seems to make him infinitely small and impossible to capture. Its smallness fills him like a vastness’” (Gunton, 469). Harry was a very weak character, yet he was very powerful in the fact that he tries to take control of everything around him.

The third turning point of Rabbit’s life was the time when Rabbit discovered himself. He consistently referred to himself as being very “lovable”, and there was also constant reference in him feeling control over women. This is the irony that lies within Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom character. He was unable to awaken himself and face reality, yet at the same time he tried to take control of his life and others. The most powerful passage that shows the grim reality of Rabbit’s personality was when Rabbit said to Ruth, “If you have the guts to be yourself, other people’ll pay your price” (Updike, 129). This is the truth about Rabbit’s character. One of the most important parts of Rabbit’s life was the birth of his little daughter, Rebecca June Angstrom. She was a beautiful little baby, and it is what had made Harry come back to Janice. He left Ruth to go stay with his real wife at the hospital. Afterwards, he went back to live with Janice. Then came the sexual tension, Rabbit and Janice were fighting again about having sex. Janice felt humiliated and insulted. “I’m not your wh*re, Harry” (Updike, 213). He ran again, he ran to Ruth. Janice became very depressed shortly afterwards, and when being drunk, she was trying to clean Rebecca in the tub, she drowned their little baby! When Rabbit heard of the news, he was heartbroken. He couldn’t run anymore, “His chest begins to hurt and he slows to a walk” (Updike, 233). It seemed as if this would be the end of Rabbit’s journey, but surprisingly it wasn’t.

The death of Rebecca could’ve been perceived to be Rabbit’s final turning point, however he remained unchanged. The most drastic turning point in Rabbit’s life came when he ran from the funeral after shocking everyone with his comment to Janice and the whole entire congregation, “Don’t look at me, I didn’t kill her. You all keep acting as if I did it. I wasn’t anywhere near. She’s (Janice) the one” (Updike, 253). From that point, Rabbit ran away. Eccles tried to catch him, but Rabbit ran far. He ran all the way into Brewer, and asked Ruth to take him back. As always, he wanted to find and hide in his safe “corner”. He couldn’t live through life by himself; he messed up everything around him, destroying his life and life of others. Ruth said that she’d take him back if he divorced Janice, and since Ruth became pregnant with his baby, she used that as a type of “blackmail” to try to get Rabbit back. He was obviously very overwhelmed, and in the end he did all that he was able to do, “He runs. Ah: runs. Runs” (Updike, 264). He had once again run from his problems, away from everyone that he knew, and from reality.

The journey of Rabbit was a long and winding road. His life was once a “hoop dreams” and illusions. His life seemed so bright, and so powerful at the beginning. However, on Rabbit’s journey, Rabbit becomes a very weak and selfish character who only cares about himself, and who fears the reality. He started his journey when he had left Janice, he ran. When he tried to deny his fault in the death of Rebecca, he ran. Rabbit portrayed the true characteristics of a real rabbit, which is escaping from all of the problems that one must face and destroying all around him. “You’re Mr.Death himself. You’re not just nothing, you’re worse than nothing” (Updike, 260). Rabbit did not kill his baby, and he did not do anything physically to harm anybody, but his ‘doing nothing’ is the reason of his misfortunes. “No, you don’t do anything”, says Ruth, “You just wander around with the kiss of death” (Updike, 260). And so, Rabbit wonders around and “runs. Ah, runs. Runs” (Updike, 264). Maybe, some day, he will realize that there is no place to hide and it is impossible to run away from himself.

-BIBLIOGRAPHY-

Gunton, Sharon R., and Jean C. Stine. "Thomas R. Edwards." Contemporary Literary Criticism. 23rd ed. 23 vols. Detroit: Gale Research Company, n.d.

Hennings, Suzanne. John Updike. Uphaus: Frederick Ungar Company, 1980. 19-31.

Schiff, James A. John Updike, Revised. New York: Twayne, 1998. 7-13.

Updike, John. Rabbit, Run. United States: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1996. 5-264.