‘Damn, that fool can write’: how Martin Amis made everyone up their game

He exploded into the tweedy world of literature, a young, pouting and outrageously brash crusader for prose. Our writer remembers her encounters with the novelist, whose smarts and chutzpah confounded his peers‘You’ll be reading me every now and then at least until about 2080, weather permitting. And when you go, maybe my afterlife, too, will come to an end, my afterlife of words.” So wrote Martin Amis in his heavily autobiographical final novel Inside Story in 2020. With a body of work spanning 50 years, he leaves 15 novels, two short-story collections, one memoir and seven book-length works of journalism and history. Did posterity matter to him? Hell, yes. “There is only one value judgment in literature: time,” he insisted.Back in 2009, I called Amis – as editors all over the world would have been calling or emailing leading writers on Saturday night – to ask if he might write a tribute to the American novelist John Updike, who had just died. Time was tight and we were aiming high, but as with every major (and not so major) event at that time, Amis was the writer everyone was after. And on Updike, the last postwar American literary giant? It had to be him. Happily, he felt a duty to contribute to what Gore Vidal called “book chat”. Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2023-05-22 05:00:48 UTC ]

Other news stories related to: "‘Damn, that fool can write’: how Martin Amis made everyone up their game"


A Flat Place

‘If all things were equal, what were we even doing here? Why weren’t we lying on our living-room floors, watching the dance of the dust, today and every day?’ Memoir by Noreen Masud. The post A Flat Place appeared first on Granta. Continue reading at Granta

[ Granta | 2024-03-18 17:23:09 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lit Hub Daily: March 15, 2024

“Interior design’s aim is to make reading easy. It creates order out of chaos and bestows authority (warranted or not) on an author’s words.” On book design beyond the cover. | Lit Hub Art The accidental icon Lyn Slater on style, rebellion, and aging with attitude. | Lit Hub Memoir What do Leo... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2024-03-15 10:30:28 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Eating in the Club- Cookbooks and Foodie Memoirs for Your Book Club

Which cookbook or foodie memoir would you like your book club to discuss and make the food from? Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2024-03-13 17:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Leslie Jamison Writes A Different Kind of Love Story In “Splinters”

Leslie Jamison’s new memoir Splinters follows the aftermath of divorce and the awakening of motherhood, but it explores desire more than it does any kind of death. Jamison wants to make meaning, to connect, to love, to feel, to mother, to write, and to revise her life endlessly. There are losses... Continue reading at Electric Literature

[ Electric Literature | 2024-03-08 12:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lit Hub Daily: March 8, 2024

“I am fascinated by the mismatch of these two systems, the fact that we can occupy two temporal spaces simultaneously…” Grace Loh Prasad on finding meaning in the space between Chinese and Western astrology, and what it means to remember her translator father. |  Lit Hub Memoir Jennifer Croft on... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2024-03-08 11:30:08 UTC ]
More news stories like this


What’s Going On with Kara Swisher’s Book Tour?

The veteran tech journalist is promoting her memoir with tech bros like Sam Altman. Continue reading at Slate

[ Slate | 2024-03-06 10:50:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


The Best New Book Releases Out March 5, 2024

A new mystery from the Queen of Irish detective fiction, a memoir by RuPaul, and a trippy, shifting narrative set in Prague all round out today's new releases. Which ones are you thinking of picking up? Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2024-03-05 12:30:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Book Review: ‘The House of Hidden Meanings,’ by RuPaul

Chronicling the high-heeled path to drag-queen superstardom, the new memoir also reveals a celebrity infatuated with his sense of a special destiny. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2024-03-05 10:00:18 UTC ]
More news stories like this


A Memoir Shouldn’t Boss You Around

Lily Meyer recommends books that recollect personal experience without being prescriptive. Continue reading at The Atlantic

[ The Atlantic | 2024-03-01 17:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lit Hub Daily: February 28, 2024

 “These girls thought themselves saints of something, and I nodded and kneeled.” Emmeline Cline on eating disorder memoirs and the contagion of identification. | Lit Hub Memoir Steven W. Thrasher on the murder of journalists in Gaza and the loss of critical American voices in journalism: “What... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2024-02-28 11:30:35 UTC ]
More news stories like this


The Best New Book Releases Out February 27, 2024

Today's new releases include a follow up to Tommy Orange's THERE THERE, a memoir of grief, a secret, anti-Confederacy spy society, and more. Which ones will you TBR? Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2024-02-27 13:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lit Hub Daily: February 27, 2024

“I was still reporting to my father, the things I had read and all that I had remembered.” Amitava Kumar on family, loss, and resonating with the words of other writers. | Lit Hub Memoir “Even in the worst of times, humans have a way of coming together to lighten the load and provide hope […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2024-02-27 11:30:51 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lit Hub Daily: February 22, 2024

What’s Aisha Sabatini Sloan reading? Diana Arterian on the author’s nightstand. | Lit Hub Criticism “The intimacy I feel with what my home once was cannot be reconciled with what downtown has become.” Emma Dries reflects on her childhood home and how 9/11 changed downtown Manhattan forever. |... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2024-02-22 11:30:18 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Interview: Brontez Purnell

“I’ve been prank-calling Justin Torres for like two decades,” says the poet and performer, whose new book is called “Ten Bridges I’ve Burnt: A Memoir in Verse.” Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2024-02-22 10:00:27 UTC ]
More news stories like this


The Best New Book Releases Out February 20, 2024

In today's new releases, there's an epic story of a conjuror-made safe haven in 1830s St. Louis, a feminist retelling of Zorro, a Cambodian food-based memoir of survival, and more. Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2024-02-20 13:30:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Leslie Jamison! Michiko Kakutani! The wildness of Old English! 23 new books out today.

It’s another Tuesday, and that means that a bevy of beautiful new books are out. And it’s a brilliant bevy indeed: below, you’ll find twenty-three new titles to consider that span an incredible range, including a raw new memoir from Leslie Jamison on motherhood and the self; the esteemed... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2024-02-20 09:46:58 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Lit Hub Daily: February 19, 2024

Kate Sidley on writing in the aftermath of a home robbery: “When bad things happen, they happen off-page, out of sight, and with a certain delicacy.” | Lit Hub Memoir Lockdown may be over, but what did it to to our collective sense of balance? How the pandemic ruined our understanding of “free”... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2024-02-19 11:30:44 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Years Later, ‘The Year of Magical Thinking’ Wields Different Magic

As his own life unfolds, an artist reconsiders his reaction to Joan Didion’s memoir about loss. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2024-02-17 10:04:10 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Kara Swisher Is Sick of Tech People, So She Wrote a Book About Them

Silicon Valley’s top pundit dishes on her memoir Burn Book, immature billionaires, and whether she’s actually mean. Continue reading at Wired

[ Wired | 2024-02-15 11:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this


Can We Please Put an End to Overperformed Audibooks?

Britney Spears is perfect and her nasal voice with a Southern accent and just the right touch of vocal fry is perfect. Which is why I was so surprised to hear Michelle Williams, an actress who is also perfect, read the audio version of Britney’s memoir with a bit of a drawl but mostly very […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2024-02-15 09:55:31 UTC ]
More news stories like this