by Kingsley Amis
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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
A man who considered boredom the worst offense in fiction and nearly the worst offense in life, British novelist Kingsley Amis (1922-1995) is wrought larger than life in Eric Jacobs's engaging biography. Through his student years at Oxford (where "drinking, smoking, and behaving badly" formed the basis for many a friendship), his marriages and simultaneous affairs, his less-than- stellar teaching career, and his highly routinized years as writer and pub dweller, Amis was a merciless raconteur both in print and in person. He shunned all manner of things phony, fashionable, and, of course, boring, and honed his intellect into the acerbic observations that run through all his novels, from Lucky Jim to You Can't Do Both.
A man who considered boredom the worst offense in fiction and nearly the worst offense in life, British novelist Kingsley Amis (1922-1995) is wrought larger than life in Eric Jacobs's engaging biography. Through his student years at Oxford (where "drinking, smoking, and behaving badly" formed the basis for many a friendship), his marriages and simultaneous affairs, his less-than- stellar teaching career, and his highly routinized years as writer and pub dweller, Amis was a merciless raconteur both in print and in person. He shunned all manner of things phony, fashionable, and, of course, boring, and honed his intellect into the acerbic observations that run through all his novels, from Lucky Jim to You Can't Do Both.
Jacobs plays to the Amis anti-academic mentality. The biography contains no scholarly apparatus and is happily footnote-free. The many colorful anecdotes are drawn from scotch-laced afternoon conversations with Amis in his later years and from peppery correspondence between Amis and such lifelong friends as poet Philip Larkin (whom Amis befriended because they were "savagely uninterested in the same things"). Jacobs is diligent about forming connections between the characters in Amis's fiction and the real-life sorrows and anxieties of their author: losing his virginity when an Oxford undergraduate to a girl who primed him with a sex manual is closely replayed in the novel You Can't Do Both. The overall effect is a clear view into a man of outrageous wit and genius and into the large legacy of novels, poetry, and essays he bequeathed. --Joan Urban
From Library Journal
Praised as a superb prose stylist, British writer Amis, who died in 1995, was nonetheless controversial, variously labeled a Communist, Thatcher conservative, alcoholic, misogynist, and philander. Even in The King's English, an entertaining manual that is hardly meant to be exhaustive, Amis's wit and candid opinion prevail. Anyone wishing to distinguish between the words belly and stomach (don't even consider tummy) or feeling particular angst over the crossed 7, the disappearance of Latin, and the use of such popular expressions as in-depth, in terms of, or whatever will find a discerning explanation. For insight into Amis's life and work, readers can turn to the authorized biography by Jacobs, a Fleet Street journalist and broadcaster. Amis wrote 24 novels, including the acclaimed Lucky Jim, plus several works of poetry and nonfiction. Focusing on the novels, Jacobs deftly reveals a man who is not always admirable or likable but is certainly intriguing. Recommended for literary collections.ARobert Kelly, Fort Wayne Community Schs., IN
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Citations
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7
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- Postwar Academic Fiction: Satire, Ethics, Community by Kenneth Womack in Back Matter (1), and Back Matter (2)
- Experience by Martin Amis in Back Matter
- Challenging Ideas in Psychiatric Nursing by Liam Clarke in Back Matter
- Madame Bovary, C'est Moi: The Great Characters of Literature and Where They Came From by Andre Bernard in Back Matter
- Scraps of the Untainted Sky: Science Fiction, Utopia, Dystopia by Thomas Moylan in Back Matter
See all 7 books citing this book
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