The John Updike Writers in Society Lecture Records include letters from Updike addressed to Carla Cooper, Executive Director of University Relations, and David Farmer, Head of Special Collections, regarding arrangements for the author's campus visit and interviews. Also included in the collection are the opening remarks of Robin Downes, Director of Libraries, for the luncheon honoring Updike, and an excerpt signed by the author from his first novel The Poorhouse Fair. The remainder of the collection consists of letters from Updike to the University of Houston written after his visit. The Special Collections Department of the University of Houston Libraries has over two hundred of Updike's novels and collections of short stories, poetry and criticism, including first and later editions, foreign editions, broadsides, and private press books, many of them signed by the author.