Subject
Martin Amis: VN and homosexuality (fwd)
Date
Body
EDITOR's NOTE. I suspect that Amis' seeming quote noted below by Corinne
Laura Scheiner <clschein@midway.uchicago.edu> is just a very loose
paraphrase of VN's remark to Edmund Wilson about his indifference to women
writers. Amis is indeed an admirer of VN who pops up frequently in his own
work.
-------------------------------------------
Although NABOKOV-L's discussion of VN and homosexuality seems to have died
down, I recently came across the following passage in Martin Amis' _The
Information_ which refers to VN and "homosexuality" in a completely
different manner:
There was a silence. To fill it, Richard said, 'Has anyone ever
really established whether men prefer to read men? Whether women prefer
to read women?'
'Oh please. What is this?' said the female columnist. 'We're not
talking about motorbikes or knitting patterns. We're talking about
_literature_ for God's sake.'
Even when he was in familiar company (his immediate family, for
instance) it sometimes seemed to Richard that those gathered in the room
were not quite authentic selves--that they had gone away and then come
back not quite right, half remade or reborn by some blasphemous,
cack-handed and above all inexpensive process. In a circus, in a
funhouse. All flakey and carny. Not quite themselves. Himself very much
included.
He said, 'Is this without interest? Nabokov said he was frankly
homosexual in his literary tastes. I don't think men and women write and
read in exactly the same way. They go at it differently.'
[Martin Amis, _The Information_ (London: Flamingo, 1996): 29]
Amis has interviewed Vera Nabokov (_The Observer_, 1981 and reprinted in
_Visiting Mrs. Nabokov and Other Excursions_ (New York: Harmony Books,
1993): 113-120) and has published an article on Lolita ("Lolita
Reconsidered," _The Atlantic_ 270:3 (September 1992): 109-120). Amis has
often been compared to VN and I think VN's influence can definitely be
felt in the narrator's remarks on authentic selves. However, Amis gives
no indication of where Nabokov may have made the remark attributed to him
above.
Corinne Scheiner
University of Chicago
clschein@midway.uchicago.edu
Laura Scheiner <clschein@midway.uchicago.edu> is just a very loose
paraphrase of VN's remark to Edmund Wilson about his indifference to women
writers. Amis is indeed an admirer of VN who pops up frequently in his own
work.
-------------------------------------------
Although NABOKOV-L's discussion of VN and homosexuality seems to have died
down, I recently came across the following passage in Martin Amis' _The
Information_ which refers to VN and "homosexuality" in a completely
different manner:
There was a silence. To fill it, Richard said, 'Has anyone ever
really established whether men prefer to read men? Whether women prefer
to read women?'
'Oh please. What is this?' said the female columnist. 'We're not
talking about motorbikes or knitting patterns. We're talking about
_literature_ for God's sake.'
Even when he was in familiar company (his immediate family, for
instance) it sometimes seemed to Richard that those gathered in the room
were not quite authentic selves--that they had gone away and then come
back not quite right, half remade or reborn by some blasphemous,
cack-handed and above all inexpensive process. In a circus, in a
funhouse. All flakey and carny. Not quite themselves. Himself very much
included.
He said, 'Is this without interest? Nabokov said he was frankly
homosexual in his literary tastes. I don't think men and women write and
read in exactly the same way. They go at it differently.'
[Martin Amis, _The Information_ (London: Flamingo, 1996): 29]
Amis has interviewed Vera Nabokov (_The Observer_, 1981 and reprinted in
_Visiting Mrs. Nabokov and Other Excursions_ (New York: Harmony Books,
1993): 113-120) and has published an article on Lolita ("Lolita
Reconsidered," _The Atlantic_ 270:3 (September 1992): 109-120). Amis has
often been compared to VN and I think VN's influence can definitely be
felt in the narrator's remarks on authentic selves. However, Amis gives
no indication of where Nabokov may have made the remark attributed to him
above.
Corinne Scheiner
University of Chicago
clschein@midway.uchicago.edu