Visiting Mrs. Nabokov: And Other ExcursionsA tantalizing collection of classic essays from one of the most gifted writers of his generation. • "The brainy, sarcastic, tender intelligence at the center of these pieces can make you laugh out loud: they can also move you to tears." —People 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." "His fascination with the observable world is utterly promiscuous: he will address a cathedral and a toilet seat with the same peeled-eyeball intensity." —John Updike |
Contents
Watford in China | |
John Updike | |
the Womens Game | |
J G Ballard | |
The Rolling Stones at Earls Court | |
Visiting Mrs Nabokov | |
Frankfurt | |
Snooker with Julian Barnes | |
Salman Rushdie | |
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American Asimov asked Baker Ballard Beatles beauty Bellow Benn Benn’s Braine Burgess Bush called Cannes chess crowd Dan Quayle darts Die of Heartbreak Dmitri drink Elton John everything eyes face father feel felt film football Frankfurt girls happened head Heartbreak human 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 one’s Paul Sammon perhaps Peter Weller Philip Larkin play players Polanski Pritchett Quayle Reagan RoboCop Rushdie Salman Salman Rushdie seemed sense sexual snooker Soviet sport star Steffi story street talk tell tennis There’s things thought took Treckie Updike Updike’s Véra Vilitzer Watford What’s wife women write young