Vilnius pedagogical university faculty of foreign languages department of english philology

Updike’s sensibility, however, is specifically Christian – an alert, open, human, sensual Calvinism; a tension of the spirit stung by the pressure of death, uncommonly driven by passions of sensual and sexual nostalgia. Updike’s inner world is not Catholic. It is almost wholly Platonic: his art is ever bitten by the pain of memory. His vision forces itself to press through the hard, defined realities of toothpaste tubes, wooden shingles, sea coral, and exquisitely described female nakedness to a world more real. So deep is Updike’s confidence in that distant world that the hard, glorious shapes of this one are no danger for him; his exquisite control of sensual detail springs from a consciousness whose source is elsewhere. His radical dualism makes myth and symbol his necessary tools, familiar, warm and restful in his hand” (Quoted by Vargo, pp. 7-8).

Consequently, turning back to The Centaur, Updike’s religion is more universal than Catholicism or even Christianity. It is multifaceted, it declares that God, love and happiness live in every single stone, so one has to recognize and extract them.

The theme of God is present in nearly all of Updike’s works. His protagonists frequently ask themselves rhetorical questions like “what is the purpose of living?”, “what is God?”, “what is there after death?” The three generations of the Caldwells contemplate the same questions. Caldwell’s father, dying in his bed is frightened by the fact that he is going to be eternally forgotten. George Caldwell himself says to the doctor during his visit: “I wouldn’t mind plugging ahead at something I wasn’t any good at […] if I knew what the hell the point of it all was. I ask, and nobody’ll tell me.” (The Centaur, p. 120) Finally, Peter refers to his girlfriend:


I consider the life we have made together, with its days spent without relation to the days the sun keeps and its baroque arabesques of increasingly attenuated emotion and its furnishings like a scattering of worn-out Braques and its rather wistful half-Freudian half- Oriental sex-mysticism, and I wonder, Was it for this that my father gave up his life? (The Centaur, p. 244)

Updike’s protagonists wonder what countervails against the unbearable chaos of life which will sooner or later destroy all the humanity. That chaos is felt throughout The Centaur; it flavors all the events with absurdity and presents the meaninglessness of contemporary life.

The resistance could be hidden in the absence of doubts, naïveté, and ignorance. Unfortunately, this possibility has already escaped Caldwell and is beginning to escape Peter. They cannot simply live without questioning themselves about the purpose and meaning of life. They do not accept living in a mechanized civilization where automatic mechanisms are appreciated more than people. The majority of people live for driving, listening to the radio and watching television. However, George Caldwell and the mechanized heaven worshiped by many Americans are sworn enemies; it is symbolized by the constant misadventures with his car.
Can religion play the role of the rescuer? Unfortunately, it did not rescue even Caldwell’s father who was drearily searching for purpose while dying in his bed: “Do you think I’ll be eternally forgotten?” (The Centaur, p. 86) His mournful experience closed the way to religion for his son and his grandson even. Caldwell says about him: “Christ, the only place I can go if I leave this school is the junkyard. I’m no good for anything else. I never was. I never studied. I never thought. I’ve always been scared to. My father studied and thought and on his deathbed he lost his religion.” (The Centaur, p. 225) In order to redouble this feeling Updike portrays a young priest Reverend March. He is “tall and handsome” (The Centaur, p. 211), a man made by war. However, when the science teacher wants to talk to him about some very important things – religion and faith, March “has to leave off laughing with Vera to take the offered hand” (The Centaur, p. 227). It is obvious for George that the priest does not want to talk to him despite it is his job.
Caldwell is serious in his intentions, he needs help and understanding, he needs advice: “I hope I’m not interrupting you and Vera here; the fact is that I’m badly troubled in my mind.” (The Centaur, p. 227) Nevertheless, March does not care about the teacher asking for help: