The news of the pass－ing of American liter－ary icon John Updike saddened the whole world. In China, the 76－year－old Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, who died of lung cancer on January 27, is deeply mourned by his readers. It is Updike"s Rabbit series that opened a window to American society, and helped Chinese people know the true face of the lives and thinking of the American middle class.