The Information
The Information
'And then there is the information, which is nothing, and comes at
night'. This is the final sentence in Martin Amis' The Information.
I am not a literary critic, as I decided a long time ago to reserve at
least some small amount of naive pleasure in reading fiction. Amis' novel,
first published in 1995, is generous to me. It offers a wicked mixture
of stylistic flair, dry humour and intellectual stimulation. It also has
a plot.
Plot
Richard Tull, clever, misanthropic and unsuccessful novelist,
is embittered by the oustanding success of his friend Gwyn Barry's
inferior literary work Amelior. Gwyn Barry writes pure trex, innocuous,
optimistic and vapid tales about a utopia:, and presents himself in interviews
as leading a similarly blissfully inane life with his wife Lady Demeter.
By contrast, Richard Tull is oppressed by the anxieties and drudgeries
of his everyday life with his wife Gina, and twin sons Marius
and Marco. Richard Tull decides to fuck Gwyn Barry up, and employs
the agencies of wild-boy Steve Cousins ("Scozzy"), and his associates
13 and Crash. And so it goes.
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