Rabbit, Run

Rabbit, Run Summary | Section 1 Summary (through page 48) Summary

The first few pages of the novel introduce the character of Rabbit Angstrom, whose real name is Harry. Rabbit, we learn, is his childhood knick name and he is now 26. We first see him standing watching some inner city kids play basketball. He is described as a somewhat frightening figure smoking a cigarette and wearing a dark suit. The children wonder why an older man is hanging around and wonder if he wants to take them "in back of the ice plant" (which we understand means for sexual molestation). For his part Rabbit thinks about how young people make older people feel old.

A stray bounce brings the ball to Rabbit and he makes a basket from long range. He then starts to play with the kids, and his skill and height make him a formidable adversary, even when he plays with only one teammate against five others. Rabbit admires the skill of his teammate, and foresees a bright future for him. He compares the young man to himself, and laments the fact that his athletic career has ended in obscurity.

After his game, Rabbit runs through the dirty urban landscape. He enjoys running, and as he does so, Updike describes the streets and season in detail. We learn that it is March and Rabbit lives on Wilbur Street in Mt. Judge, Pennsylvania, and that he lives in a neighborhood filled with frame houses built in the 1930s. He arrives at home and sees a discarded plastic clown under his front steps. He finds his door locked, and opens it with his key.

Inside, he finds his pregnant wife Janice drinking a strong whiskey drink (an "Old-fashioned") and watching Disney's Mouseketeers on TV. He considers her as he puts his coat away and notices she is beginning to look older. He notes his resentment that she locked the door on him, and asks her where the family car is. She tells him that their son Nelson is at his mother's house, while the car is at her mother's. Rabbit grumbles about her leaving the car at her mother's, and the two watch TV briefly. As they do, we learn through Rabbit's thoughts that he is a demonstrator for a kitchen gadget called the MagiPeel.

Janice explains to Rabbit that she went shopping with her mother and got tired. He learns that she bought a bathing suit, and that she does not like being pregnant. The two argue briefly, and then Rabbit tries to make peace. She tells him he needs to collect Nelson and then pick up the car, and scolds him for playing ball with kids. She goes to the kitchen to make supper, and Updike lets us know that their fights are a common occurrence.

The narrative shifts quickly to Rabbit's thoughts again as he remembers how he and Janice used to work together. After a long day of work the two would go to Janice's shared apartment and make love. Rabbit remembers each sensation in detail, and notes that she used to be more spontaneous and put more effort into their relationship. Shifting back to the present, Rabbit gets ready to go out and notice how dirty and messy their home is. He gets his coat back out and leaves, trying to decide where to go first: his mother's or hers. As he is mulling over his options, Janice calls out the window for him to buy her cigarettes.

Rabbit then looks around and compares the hallway and his door to a trap. As he walks towards his mother's house he enjoys the trees and remembers how he used to climb up telephone poles to. He also recalls balancing on a slippery curb above filthy water to impress girls in grade school. He walks past an old farmhouse, and notes that it has been transformed from a solitary outpost "which once commanded half of the acreage the town is now built on" to being abandoned and unsightly.

Next he passes the Sunshine Athletic Association, and Updike tells the reader about Rabbit's former basketball coach who is said to live there. The coach, Marty Tothero, had been an influential figure in the town before being disgraced due to a scandal, and is said to be still "manipulating" local events. Rabbit feels fear at the thought of Tothero, but also respect based on their past relationship.

Updike then describes how the town of Mt. Judge is separated from the city of Brewer by a shoulder of mountain. He returns to the idea of children playing, and how the woods on the mountain can be frightening. Rabbit then "stealthily" approaches his childhood home on Jackson Street. He recalls his neighbors of several years, the Zims. Mr. and Mrs. Zim had a daughter named Carolyn, and Mrs. Zim would yell at her constantly while Mr. Zim defended her (Carolyn). Despite this abuse, Carolyn was said to be a sweet-natured girl.

He also remembers the next neighbor, an old man who moved in after the Zims moved to Cleveland. He describes how the old man refused to cut their half of the thin strip of grass between their homes, and how his mother had let the grass grow until a town employee told them it had to be cut. He also remembers that he had hated when his father and mother had argued.

Once at the window, Rabbit peeks in and sees his son Nelson and his mother. Nelson is eating, which brings praise from Rabbit's mother, father, and sister. Rabbit looks at his mother, who looks happy, while his father looks old. His sister Miriam is dressed up, and Rabbit reflects that she wears too much makeup. Nelson makes her smile, and Rabbit is again reminded of his childhood and how this home is happier than the one he has created for Nelson with Janice.

Rabbit suddenly decides to leave. He goes to his mother in law's house and finds his car, which we learn was sold to him by Janice's father. He gets the car going after a stall and then heads out onto the highway to Philadelphia, vowing to himself not to return to Brewer again. He switches on the radio, and has a clean happy feeling as he drives away. He then starts to think of Janice cooking him dinner, which makes him sad. He tries to think of first basketball and then Nelson, but finds himself unable to picture happy things.

As he drives away, Rabbit's mind is full of images; some of his own childhood, and others of sex and courtship with Janice. He then thinks of how Janice would now be frantic, and that she is "dumb." Rabbit drives faster, and reflects that although he is going to Philadelphia he hates it. He wants to go to south to warmer climates but realizes he is going east, which feels like a trap. He then notes a sign saying that Route 100 to Wilmington is to his right. He notes that Wilmington is owned by the "Du Ponts," and recalls a basketball game he once played in the area. Route 100 feels like a trap as well so he turns off on a narrow road.

Rabbit then considers what it would be like to sleep with a Du Pont woman. He wonders whether rich girls are frigid or interested in sex, and decides they are probably the same as other women. He then vividly describes how women get sexually excited.

Rabbit stops for gas and learns that he is only 16 miles from Brewer. He asks the gas station attendant for a map, and the attendant is soon curious about where he is going. Rabbit perceives this as suspicion, and feels that the old man suspects him of having committed a crime. Rabbit cannot decide where he wants to go, and the old man advises him to decide where he is going. Rabbit is skeptical of his advice and drives away.

Rabbit reaches a town to the south and encounters an Amish buggy. He ponders briefly about how the Amish hate his kind, and how they have sex out in the fields. He describes them as fanatics, and questions the sense of riding around on busy roads at night in a horse buggy. Upon reaching Lancaster, Rabbit stops at a diner and looks at a map. He picks out a new route to the south, and then compares the diner's apple pie with the pie his mother used to make. He leaves the diner and heads south, listening to the radio and listing off the towns he goes through.

When he enters Maryland, Rabbit continues driving and reaches Route 1, which he had earlier recalled runs from Maine to Florida. He stops for gas and a map, and as he reads it he reflects that he wants to avoid big cities on his way south because he feels like cities such as Baltimore and Washington, DC are places he could get stopped. His goal is to avoid any busy places, and he notes to himself that that once he reaches the Appalachians he can slide down them and "shake all thoughts of the mess behind him."

He drives on through the night, and finds that the radio is changing from modern music to old standards. Just before midnight he stops for coffee, and feels like the other customers are staring at him. He begins to feel that he is different from the people around him and wonders if this means he has become disconnected from all of America. As he heads for his car he feels someone is following him, and notes that his car is the only one in the lot with Pennsylvania plates.

He drives on, but becomes angry when he realizes he is not making good time. He begins driving faster, and berates himself for not being further south by this time. He is frustrated by the fact that the landscape has not changed since he left Pennsylvania. He turns onto an unmarked road heading south, a shortcut he has decided on. While his instincts "protest," Rabbit compares the turn to the leap of faith his mind was forced to make when his coach tried to change his free throw shooting style.

The shortcut starts wide and narrows until his car is scraping the trees on the sides of the road, but Rabbit carries on until he encounters another car. Though the speeding car scares him, Rabbit is pleased that the road goes somewhere. However, he soon finds himself at a dead end, and realizes the car had come from a park which has cars parked at it (a "lover's lane"). At the end of the road, Rabbit examines the map but finds himself unable to figure out where he is.

Defeated, Rabbit heads back to Mt. Judge. As he drives he finds himself in a calm state beyond exhaustion, and he compares this state to the last quarter of a basketball game. He describes the last quarter as a time when he became disconnected from the crowd and started to play "in the zone" with a keen awareness of the ball and the net. Eventually he reaches Brewer, and instead of going home he goes to the Sunshine Athletic Association. He settles down in the front seat to go to sleep, remembering that it is now Saturday.

As he tries to sleep he becomes obsessed with getting caught and with finding his old coach. He wonders what everyone he left behind is thinking. As he drifts in sleep, he remembers sex with Janice, and how she was shy about showing off her naked body. He recalls one time after they were married when she was naked just out of the shower.

He wakes up and sees Tothero, then jumps out of the car to talk to him. Rabbit tells Tothero he has left home because Janice is an alcoholic. Tothero tells him he should have drunk with her to help her quit drinking, and Rabbit asks for a place to sleep. Tothero offers him a bed if they can talk about Rabbit's marriage once he wakes up. Rabbit promises, and Tothero takes him inside expressing surprise that his former basketball star has become a "monster."

Tothero takes him to his modest room, and watches Rabbit undress and get into bed. Rabbit is surprised at Tothero's behavior, since "Tothero was always known as a lech but never a queer." He realizes Tothero misses the basketball changing room. His thoughts turn back to sex and a young couple he saw in West Virginia. He remembers a trip to a whorehouse in Texas, where the hooker had faked an orgasm. When he became angry atwith this, she handled the situation calmly and told him to leave. Rabbit falls asleep to the sounds of an auto body shop nearby.