Martin Amis: Lucre, Love, and Literature An Essay by Peter Childs

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Martin Amis Lucre, Love, and LiteratureAn
Essay by Peter Childs
Zach Williams
Zhong Zhuang
Kyle Wright
Scott Gildemeyer
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Basic Info

• This article is concerned mostly with Amiss lack
  of understanding for other people, and rather his
  personal views and biases presented in all of his
  works. It is mainly concerned with the perception
  that many of Amiss stories are anchored around
  three main themes, those which consist of money,
  sex, and the apocalypse in one form or another.

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What is the purpose of this criticism?

• To show that Amis has possibly used similar
  themes throughout many of his novels, but simply
  disguised them in different ways to make them
  seem separate and dissimilar. The author also
  aims to prove that Amis is not out to make the
  reader feel sympathetic for the main character,
  but rather he is out to receive support on his
  own personal views.

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Does the author debate, or does he simply wish to
empress.

• From our views, we found that Childs wanted to
  express his views in a debatable fashion. He
  never made it seem that his views were the only
  possibilities, but rather still left the opinions
  open for suggestions. However, through the
  reading of this article, one could adopt the
  feeling that Childs does not want you to question
  his view, but because of the strong emphasis on
  many points, he would rather you simply accept
  his views.

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On what aspect of the story does the author focus?

• Childs mainly focuses on the comparability of all
  of Amiss themes in three of his major novels,
  and briefly touches on Amiss short stories.
  Childs additional center of attention would be
  that Amis is not creative enough with his
  stories, and keeps his books too close minded,
  and not open for personal thought. Childs also
  complains that Amis is too worried about his use
  of language, and not worried enough about the
  subject matter of his stories.

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Does the author build on unfounded assumptions or
on the work of other critics?

• Childs mainly speaks of views or opinions
  developed by himself. His main argument is that
  most of Amiss stories are loosely based upon the
  same themes and moral elements. Now he does make
  reference to other authors, but does not
  formulate his opinion based on theirs.

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What is the dominant method of persuasion?

• Childs chooses to use a mass of quotes from
  novels and stories written by Amis, and personal
  opinions to persuade the reader to accept his
  views. Through this, he creates a solid
  background on which to base his argument and
  enables himself to prove his points to the
  audience.

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What is the thesis statement of this essay?

• Amis is more interested in good and bad writing
  than in literature that attempts to delineate the
  good and the bad.(35)

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How is the argument organized?

• The main way that Childs has presented his
  information is similar to a standard essay. He
  presents his information in an organized
  paragraph or two, and he then proceeds to
  intricately develop each subject with continuing
  paragraphs until his desired point of view is
  reached.

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Our opinion on the argument

• Our personal opinion is that Childs argument is
  slightly hypocritical. Though he is exposing the
  closed mindedness of Amis, his essay in its self
  is very closed minded and also makes reference to
  historical events and people to further support
  his narrow mindedness.

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Reaction?

• We believe it would have been interesting to read
  these additional books mentioned in this essay to
  take on a true personal view on the topic. By not
  having read these other works, we find it hard to
  have any true background to fight Childs biases
  on, or have any information with which to argue
  it.