Why would anyone think that the world would be any different - let alone any better - if it were run by women? Has Amis never heard of Catherine de Medici or Queen Mary or the Empress Irene? Power is like a hammer - there are only so many things you can do with it.
Increasingly, Amis strikes me as one of those people who is wonderfully articulate but not really very bright.
Increasingly, Amis strikes me as one of those people who is wonderfully articulate but not really very bright.
Martin Amis is a horse's a. And these tired old notions, that men can't help themselves and that women are somehow naturally morally superior, is just convoluted sexism, very thinly veiled.
ReplyDeleteHe's funny enough but makes me wonder why anyone should care what a novelist thinks about politics or society. It's not as if writing a novel means you understand anything except plot and character and dialogue. i certainly don't.
ReplyDeleteMartin Amis has said a lot of stupid shit. But he's also written a lot of brilliant books. I would argue that Amis, for all of his faults, has a ratio of brilliance-to-crap that is really no different from Norman Mailer. But everyone is content to lionize Mailer (because he's dead) and shit upon Amis. I really wish he would get off talking about politics and simply write novels -- even half-assed political novels. But the man does have a voice and a perspective -- it's ugly, it's crass, it's often uncomfortably atavistic -- but it's still part of humanity, whether we like it or not. And I would suggest that those who can't appreciate it in some form probably have a very limited view of literature, and a very limited view of humanity.
ReplyDeleteAll true, Ed. But his last novel, House of Meetings, which I reviewed, was definitely not in the brilliant category. Oh, the writing was often excellent, as usual, but there was an emptiness at its core.
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