Understanding Martin Amis FROM THE PUBLISHER
"Understanding Martin Amis is a comprehensive reader's guide to the novels, short stories, and nonfiction written by one of Britain's most highly acclaimed and controversial authors. Building on the first edition, published in 1995, James Diedrick draws on personal interviews, reviews, and criticism, as he maps the distinctive features of Martin Amis's imaginative landscape - the sociosexual satire of Money and Yellow Dog, the bold experimentation of Time's Arrow and Night Train, and the provocative blend of autobiography and cultural analysis in Experience and Koba the Dread. Diedrick illustrates how Amis has reshaped the British literary landscape, expanding the stylistic and thematic range of fiction while creating forms adequate to the unsettling experience of postmodernity." Diedrick also analyzes an increasing cultural conservatism in Amis's work, rooted in Amis's relationship with his father, the novelist Kingsley Amis. During the first two decades of his career, the younger Amis consistently opposed his father's political and aesthetic conservatism. But his opposition has given way in recent years to frequent expressions of political and literary solidarity. Diedrick shows how this filial relationship continues to shape the son's social outlook and his career as a writer.
SYNOPSIS
Martin Amis is one of Britain's most highly acclaimed and controversial contemporary authors. Drawing upon personal interviews, reviews, and criticism, Diedrick analyzes the ways in which Amis's fiction has reshaped the British literary landscape. He also provides close readings of Amis's nonfiction collections and his uncollected essays and reviews. Diedrick (Albion College) collaborated with Amis in compiling and editing Amis's nonfiction collection The War against Clichﾽ. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
FROM THE CRITICS
Booknews
A compact (5x7") but detailed reader's guide to Amis's novels, short stories, and nonfiction. Diedrick (English, Albion College) examines Amis's development as a writer through close analysis of his writing, from the informal trilogy of his first three novels to his 1995 novel The Information. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
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