“…the Japanese interest him professionally. How do they and the Germans do it, when America's going down the tubes?”

Rabbit at Rest (1990)

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Do you have more details about the quote "…the Japanese interest him professionally. How do they and the Germans do it, when America's going down the tubes?" by John Updike?
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John Updike 240
American novelist, poet, short story writer, art critic, an… 1932–2009

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“The major suggested we go down a gully, but I knew that was the wrong way. And I told him we were not going down any gully. We were going straight through the German front line trenches back to the American lines.”

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