Category Archive: Fiction
The Information
(by Martin Amis) (1995) A glittering specimen of that great archetype, the literary revenger’s tale. Richard Tull toils in vain on his indifferent and overlooked novels – friend Gwyn Barry, at the same time, produces fraudulent, flatulent pulp and is venerated and enriched. Tull decides to ignore the sage words of Richard Nixon when he resigned in disgrace and despair: “others may hate you, but those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.” Amis scores a direct hit here: As his fraud’s best-seller sequel, Amelior Regained, is ‘barbarically plain’, this literary revenger’s tale…
Continue Reading →The Green Man
(by Kingsley Amis) The landlord of “The Green Man” pub has an alarming drinking problem and wandering hands. Also, there is some monolithic horticultural product about, that could cause further alarm. Amis senior’s famous book, Lucky Jim is superior to this slight work but this novella is so weird and perverse it is almost decadent.
Continue Reading →The Glass Bead Game
(by Hermann Hesse) Hesse’s ideation of his own life as a monk is a heavy but worthwhile read.
Continue Reading →The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress
(by Beryl Bainbridge) An odd, slight, oddly touching and slightly naff story of a road trip to oblivion, culminating in the death of RFK; but is the dysfunctional, libidinous Rose ‘the girl in the polka dot dress’ who exclaimed, ‘We shot him!’ as reported in the LA Times on 6 June 1968? Bainbridge’s last, almost finished novel is, unlike The Original of Laura, worth reading.
Continue Reading →Doctor Faustus
(by Thomas Mann) Formidably long and deep, Mann’s novel was written from 1943 to 1947 and represents his “F.U” to Germany for feting Hitler and forgetting Mann. Still, Mann was right and this work is his masterpiece, one of the most authentic studies of genius. Roger Scruton called it “Mann’s great valediction to Western culture.”
Continue Reading →