Essay Questions

Explore the commonalities between Peter and his father George as highlighted in John Updike’s The Centaur.

At a first glance, Peter and George are just father and son, sharing quite a complicated relationship. The most common thing that can be argued to be common to these characters is the fact that they both have challenges that they are tackling in their lives. George is tackling a depressive life in which he is often concerned that he has come to the end of his life. On the other hand, his son is struggling with a medical condition, psoriasis, and is constantly worried that people would come to know of his condition. He is also constantly worried about his father who consistently obsesses about death. In this way, the challenges that these characters have become a major commonality between them. The two also share a deep desire to escape from their hometown.

Explain the character of Peter as brought out in this novel.

Peter is brought out as quite a loving and caring character. Despite having his problems, and not having quite figured out his life, he is constantly worried about the status of his father. Peter has to constantly check up on his father to ensure that he is all right. Additionally, Peter is an anxious character as he is constantly worried about his health condition being discovered by people. Also, because he worries about his father despite his psoriasis, he can be argued as a selfless individual as he seems to care about his father more than he does himself.

How is death presented in this work?

The idea of a looming death is placed at a central point in John Updike’s The Centaur. It is a fear that follows the narrator’s father throughout the work and begins with his fear of having cancer. Because Goerge’s prime years of life are over, he feels that death will be his only savior and it is constantly closer than ever with each passing day. As a result of this, his son, Peter is constantly worried about him, so much that he checks on him even between his classes. Death is almost hinted at on every page of the work, traveling with the reader until later when George surrenders to his fate. Goerge can thus be argued to be the writer’s way of normalizing death so that it is viewed as part and parcel of human life and no a taboo.