Visiting Mrs. Nabokov and Other ExcursionsTo this tantalizing nonfiction collection Martin Amis brings the same megawatt wit, wickedly acute perception, and ebullient wordplay that characterize his novels. He encompasses the full range of contemporary politics and culture (high and low) while also traveling to China for soccer with Elton John and to London's darts-crazy pubs in search of the perfect throw. Throughout, he offers razor-sharp takes on such subjects as: American politics: "If history is a nightmare from which we are trying to awake, then the Reagan era can be seen as an eight-year blackout. Numb, pale, unhealthily dreamless: eight years of Do Not Disturb." Chess: "Nowhere in sport, perhaps in human activity, is the gap between the tryer and the expert so astronomical.... My chances of a chess brilliancy are the 'chances' of a lab chimp and a type writer producing King Lear." |
Contents
the Megadeath Intellectuals | 13 |
Watford in China | 34 |
John Updike | 47 |
Copyright | |
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Al Alvarez American anyway Asimov asked Baker Ballard Beatles Bellow Benn Benn's Braine Burgess Bush called Cannes chess course crowd darts David Mamet death Die of Heartbreak Dmitri drink Elton Elton John everything eyes face feel felt film Frankfurt girls happened head Heartbreak human imagine India interview Isaac Asimov John John Braine John Updike Karpov Kasparov Keith Kenneth kind Korchnoi Larkin later Layamon Lennon literary lives look lunch Madonna Matilda modern morning Nabokov Naipaul never Nicholson Baker night novel nuclear weapons perhaps Peter Weller Philip Larkin play players Polanski Pritchett Quayle Reagan RoboCop Rushdie Salman Salman Rushdie seemed sense sexual snooker soon Soviet sport star Steffi story street talk tell tennis There's things thought took Treckie turned Updike Véra Vilitzer Watford wife write young