John's review
The Rachel Papers by Martin Amis
John's review
rating:
recommended for: people who have seriously considered poetry as a career, arrogant youths
status: Read in February, 2005
rating:
recommended for: people who have seriously considered poetry as a career, arrogant youths
status: Read in February, 2005
Amis's semi-autobiographical first book. Surprisingly different than his other stuff--although the ubiquitous Obnoxious Structure is on display here (the main character has to spin his wheels in present tense for a while at the start of every chapter or else it WOULDN'T BE HIGH ART WOULD IT MARTIN), the story actually has some sense of avoiding caricature, relying on observations, moving into areas of really uncomfortable truth. The ending is kind of a botch (moving as it does into the "Gosh-what-happens-next!" of the present tense), but the ride itself--the obsessive quest of Charles to possess the super-idealized Rachel via underhanded means and fake accents--is pretty great, sort of like Catcher in the Rye or Goodbye, Columbus if the main characters of those books were sociopathic sex addicts into William Blake. Recommended!
