what are you reading now?
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Cripes. Of his novels I've only read The Book of Dave but I thought it was pretty good. His articles are ponderous and verbose for the sake of it but knowingly so, if that makes it any better. 'Abysmal at everything' is a little harsh, isn't it? I dunno, I think he's OK.
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droid
Well-known member
I hardly ever read any horror bar some lovecraft knockoffs and the odd zombie book, but this is great. It shouldn't work as its full of cliches, but it does. Somewhere between Blair witch, TCM and the wicker man. Unshowy prose but a palpable sense of dread throughout.
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Just finished. Definitely gonna have to re-read all this, I think. I'm browsing through the wolfewiki and posts on urth.net and there seems to be a ridiculous amount i've missed. Yeuch
baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
Who could replace 'Self' in that sentence to falsify it?
Will Self is good on TV as his intelligence/general decency comes across, but way too self-indulgent for other formats
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
"They say that if a million monkeys were given a million typewriters, eventually one of them would produce the complete works of Shakespeare. That may be true - but would it be worth wading through 400,000 copies of Money by Martin Amis to find out?" (cheers, Simon Munnery)
baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
London Fields is, scientifically speaking, the worst book ever written. I heard Money was a bit better; as you say though, life's short...
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
I thought 'Money' was quite good but 'London Fields' was impossible to get through. He has this weird thing about working class men - about yobs, really.
Actually I recently read his book about Stalinism 'Koba The Dread'. As always, well-written and entertaining but hamstrung by Amis's pomposity and self-consciousness. There's a bloody cringeworthy bit near the end in which Amis recalls an innocuous domestic incident - his daughter crying uncontrollably - and how he told his wife (arriving home) that ''her screams would not have been out of place in the cells of Gulag XYZ''. There is no tongue in cheek here.
I think I read somewhere that Amis is so worshipful towards Nabokov and Bellow that he is forced into attempting to be both simultaneously without much success. I haven't read much Bellow but I can see how this may be accurate - the mixture of knowingness and sentimentality, or grandiosity.
OTOH I regularly dip into 'The War On Cliche' and I think his literary reviews are excellent. He' got one of those really infectious styles that rub off on me after I've read some of his stuff, so that I have to stop myself from doing an Amis knockoff when I'm writing. I have ripped off his style in some of my music reviews. I feel that his style works for reviews because they're short and focused, whereas in his novels that show-off style just gets in the way. It all seems facetious and strained.
Actually I recently read his book about Stalinism 'Koba The Dread'. As always, well-written and entertaining but hamstrung by Amis's pomposity and self-consciousness. There's a bloody cringeworthy bit near the end in which Amis recalls an innocuous domestic incident - his daughter crying uncontrollably - and how he told his wife (arriving home) that ''her screams would not have been out of place in the cells of Gulag XYZ''. There is no tongue in cheek here.
I think I read somewhere that Amis is so worshipful towards Nabokov and Bellow that he is forced into attempting to be both simultaneously without much success. I haven't read much Bellow but I can see how this may be accurate - the mixture of knowingness and sentimentality, or grandiosity.
OTOH I regularly dip into 'The War On Cliche' and I think his literary reviews are excellent. He' got one of those really infectious styles that rub off on me after I've read some of his stuff, so that I have to stop myself from doing an Amis knockoff when I'm writing. I have ripped off his style in some of my music reviews. I feel that his style works for reviews because they're short and focused, whereas in his novels that show-off style just gets in the way. It all seems facetious and strained.
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IdleRich
IdleRich
I really like Money (the book and the thing as well when I see it) but was very disappointed by London Fields. I can't imagine reading anything else by him. I guess he's another one of those writers who is not without merit but who is only worth reading at a certain stage of your life (ie when young). He certainly seems to have been disproportionately successful and that's probably why he gets everyone's goat. If he was a minor comic writer who was discussed as much as his talent deserved I doubt that he'd be hated so much. Still it's a fair trade-off I suppose.
OK - there's also all his anti-Muslim stuff but everyone pretty much hated before that anyway didn't they?
OK - there's also all his anti-Muslim stuff but everyone pretty much hated before that anyway didn't they?
I thought 'Money' was quite good but 'London Fields' was impossible to get through. He has this weird thing about working class men - about yobs, really.
Spot on. I really hated London Fields because of this - I read it a lonnnnng time ago but I seemed to remember that he found the whole idea of a working class guy who goes to the pub inherently hilarious. Maybe he was saying something incredibly witty and zeitgeisty about class that I just missed. Or maybe he's just a twat.
Spot on. I really hated London Fields because of this - I read it a lonnnnng time ago but I seemed to remember that he found the whole idea of a working class guy who goes to the pub inherently hilarious. Maybe he was saying something incredibly witty and zeitgeisty about class that I just missed. Or maybe he's just a twat.
hucks
Your Message Here
Yup. I thought the same about the way he wrote the black characters, all teeth sucking and jewellery. A joke he was in no position to make funny.
blacktulip
Pregnant with mandrakes
I have an MA in English Literature so I know about this shit (true dat but deployed in a tongue-in-cheek manner here, etc.):
1) Every era of literature had people who garnered critical respect and/or the vote of the buying/theatre-attending public.
2) Many of them are completely unknown now, including amongst the undergraduate community.
3) Martin Amis and Will Self are two of these guys.
1) Every era of literature had people who garnered critical respect and/or the vote of the buying/theatre-attending public.
2) Many of them are completely unknown now, including amongst the undergraduate community.
3) Martin Amis and Will Self are two of these guys.