Updike, John

American author, born in the small town of Shillington in Pennsylvania, where also his earliest works take place, but then the town has the fictitious name of Olinger or Brewer. Updike's father worked as a teacher at a high school, while his mother, who was of Dutch descent, herself was trying to become an author. She published among other things a novel, Enchantment, under her girl's name Linda Grace Hoyer in 1971.