The Russian Girl [Mass Market Paperback]

Kingsley Amis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 1995

Award-winning writer Kingsley Amis's newest novel is a dazzling romp through a territory he has made triumphantly his own--the battle of the sexes and the conflicting claims of love and integrity. Art, literature, political correctness, and the gender war all come under Amis's seasoned scalpel in this corrosively funny academic satire.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A London professor of Slavonic studies jeopardizes his marriage and reputation when he falls in love with a Russian poet.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Dr. Richard Vaisey is an esteemed scholar at the London Institute of Slavonic Studies whose wife, Cordelia, has perfected the art of manipulation. When Anna Danilova, an obscure Russian poet, asks his help in freeing her brother from a Russian jail by making her "famous" and thus calling world attention to the brother's plight, Richard finds himself torn between his growing passion for her and his outright dislike of her poetry. Realizing what is going on between her husband and "the Russian girl," Cordelia, plots revenge. Vaisey's conflicting emotions allow Amis, in his acerbically witty way, to explore the nature of art, criticism, academic integrity, and, ultimately, love. Even Americans come in for a tongue lashing--"if . . . a book had to be a novel, then let it contain as little fiction as possible. Maybe it is that Americans are a nervous lot and the idea of somebody inventing people and events out of imagination, out of nothing makes them uneasy." While Richard's dilemma drives the plot, it is Cordelia's nastiness that provides the real spice. She is a wonderful character whose idiosyncrasies will be appreciated by Amis's many fans. For most academic and public libraries. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 1/94.
- David W. Henderson, Eckerd Coll. Lib., St. Petersburg, Fla.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (March 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140251723
• ISBN-13: 978-0140251722
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.6 x 7.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,278,728 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Amis crafts a timely story of post cold war social comment., January 17, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Russian Girl (Mass Market Paperback)

Not content to limit himself to his usual playgrounds of lampooning modern English society and exacerbating the battle of the sexes, Amis shows off a scholarly appreciation of the differences, once shrouded by the iron curtain, between conservative and corrupt post-Soviet Russian society and the Western world. In a very readable yarn Amis does all this without bogging down in heavy moralization. The story of the romance between a bookish British professor of Russian and a young Russian Poet in the west for the first time is entertaining, sharp, witty, and wise. This is Amis the writer as a mature sophisticate who manages to keep his erudition in check.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Another good one, November 24, 1999

By 

Larry (Washington DC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Russian Girl (Mass Market Paperback)

Well-written, entertaining, and a bit surprising. I've read almost all of his novels ... most are good, a few are great, a couple are marginal. This is a good one. It is not at all obvious that the hero is better off at the end than at the beginning. Thinking is required of the reader so if that isn't your thing, don't bother.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars entertaining, not involving, March 7, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Russian Girl (Mass Market Paperback)

A decent novel but nothing spectacular. Amis is (wordily) witty as always, but the conflict here seems contrived and the whole thing runs out of energy near the end. Too much dialogue with the prof's various friends, most of it repetitive. After reading five Amis novels I'm beginning to think his Lucky Jim was a bit of a fluke.