The Life of Kingsley AmisHere is the authorized, definitive biography of one of the most controversial figures of twentieth-century literature, renowned for his blistering intelligence, savage wit and belligerent fierceness of opinion: Kingsley Amis was not only the finest comic novelist of his generation–having first achieved prominence with the publication of Lucky Jim in 1954 and as one of the Angry Young Men–but also a dominant figure in post—World War II British writing as novelist, poet, critic and polemicist. In The Life of Kingsley Amis, Zachary Leader, acclaimed editor of The Letters of Kingsley Amis, draws not only on unpublished works and correspondence but also on interviews with a wide range of Amis’s friends, relatives, fellow writers, students and colleagues, many of whom have never spoken out before. The result is a compulsively readable account of Amis’s childhood, school days and life as a student at Oxford, teacher, critic, political and cultural commentator, professional author, husband, father and lover. Even as he makes the case for Amis’s cultural centrality–at his death Time magazine claimed that “the British decades between 1955 and 1995 should in fairness be called ‘the Amis era’”–Leader explores the writer’s phobias, self-doubts and ambitions; the controversies in which he was embroiled; and the role that drink played in a life bedeviled by erotic entanglements, domestic turbulence and personal disaster. Dazzling for its thoroughness, psychological acuity and elegant style, The Life of Kingsley Amis is exemplary: literary biography at its very best. |
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Page 7
... wrote , and the exquisite problem of the artist is eternally but to draw , by a geometry of his own , the circle in ... Larkin also distort . Larkin was central to Amis's life and art , but his centrality is magnified in the ...
... wrote , and the exquisite problem of the artist is eternally but to draw , by a geometry of his own , the circle in ... Larkin also distort . Larkin was central to Amis's life and art , but his centrality is magnified in the ...
Page 35
Zachary Leader. 2 Reading and Writing Amis started writing at a very early age . When Philip Larkin told an interviewer that he himself had begun writing ' at puberty , like everyone else ' , Amis was astonished . ' He left it until ...
Zachary Leader. 2 Reading and Writing Amis started writing at a very early age . When Philip Larkin told an interviewer that he himself had begun writing ' at puberty , like everyone else ' , Amis was astonished . ' He left it until ...
Page 97
Zachary Leader. Larkin , the most important of Amis's life . Iles , like Larkin ... wrote to Iles on 17 April 1941 , two weeks before Amis arrived at St John's ... Larkin describes him as ' impatient and contemptuous ... Any action or even ...
Zachary Leader. Larkin , the most important of Amis's life . Iles , like Larkin ... wrote to Iles on 17 April 1941 , two weeks before Amis arrived at St John's ... Larkin describes him as ' impatient and contemptuous ... Any action or even ...
Page 100
... Larkin's life which would eventually be played by a far more famous contemporary . ' Larkin described him as ' a ... wrote to Sutton in the 1940s were different from those he wrote to Gunner , Amis and , to some extent , Iles ; they were ...
... Larkin's life which would eventually be played by a far more famous contemporary . ' Larkin described him as ' a ... wrote to Sutton in the 1940s were different from those he wrote to Gunner , Amis and , to some extent , Iles ; they were ...
Page 114
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Contents
1 | |
35 | |
52 | |
71 | |
92 | |
The War | 128 |
Postwar Oxford | 161 |
Oxford and Eynsham | 204 |
Patrick and Dai | 426 |
Cambridge | 449 |
Waking Beauty | 471 |
Breakup | 500 |
Divisions | 521 |
Lefties Toffs and Bigots | 559 |
Lemmons | 600 |
Dissolution | 642 |
Swansea | 234 |
Making Lucky Jim | 257 |
Fame and Friendship | 279 |
Uncertain Feelings | 300 |
Fun | 317 |
Abroad | 330 |
Widening Horizons | 352 |
Princeton | 383 |
Nadir | 684 |
Return | 731 |
Ending Up | 766 |
Afterlife | 811 |
Notes | 827 |
Bibliography | 943 |
Index | 961 |
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Common terms and phrases
Amis and Jane Amis told Amis wrote Amis's Amises Anthony Powell Anti-Death League Archer asked Biography Blackmur Blake Morrison Bodleian boys called Colin College Conquest December Dixon drink Elizabeth Jane Howard Ellingham English Eric Jacobs Essays Faber father friends funny Fussell Gollancz Hilly Hilly's Huntington Ibid interview Jake's Thing Jane's January jazz John July June Keeley Kingsley Amis later lecturer Lemmons letter to Larkin literary lived London look Lucky Jim lunch March Martin Amis Memoirs never novel novelist November October Old Devils Oxford party Penguin Peterhouse Philip Larkin poems poet poetry political Princeton published Quoted recalls remembers Robert Conquest Russian Hide-and-Seek Sally Salwak September Slipstream sort stay story suggested Sunday Swansea Take a Girl talk tell things thought tion took Uncertain Feeling University Wain week wife women writing wrote to Larkin