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Underground > Books, Criticism & Writing >

The Green Man, by Kingsley Amis

All Acting Regiment

07:43 / 08.02.06

I'm fairly new to the Amis boys, having only read this and The Alteration by Kingsley and nothing by Martin; i'm aware that there's supposed to be a strong strain of mysogny swilling about the place but am not entirely sure, so first off, if anyone could divulge their views that would be helpful- a large part of The Green Man revolves around the egotistical prick-ness of the narrator.

Secondly, has anyone else read it and what did you think of it? Scary? Funny? Fun?

sleazenation

08:12 / 08.02.06

Not read it, only seen the BBC adaptation starring Albert Finney. I didn't particularly pick up on a terrible vein of misogyny. True the main character is a terrible womaniser who cheats on his wife with his friend's wife and then connives to get them into bed with each other through deception... but it doesn't have it all his own way and both his wife and mistress eventually leave him... and the womanizing is part of an counterpoint between the ghost of a rather less savory 'womanizer' Dr Thomas Underhill...

It's important to the narrative that MAurice is no angel...

All Acting Regiment

14:58 / 08.02.06

Absolutely; Maurice is "canterbury tales" style baudy whereas Underhill is a complete monster, in many ways more so than the Green Man itself, which comes across more as a form of life which is being abused by evil, rather than inherently so.

matthew.

15:14 / 08.02.06

re: the misogyny

In Martin Amis' Experience, a non-linear memoir about his relationship with his father, he addresses the misogyny and says it was the delusions of an old man embittered by two failed marriages and sons with failed marriages. Kingsley always had a mistrust of woman, but it wasn't til he was dumped for the second time that he espoused such bullshit views about women. Martin doesn't make much of it; he thinks his father was just spouting crap and didn't really believe it to the extent that it appears in the later novels.

All Acting Regiment

16:58 / 08.02.06

Fair enough. I suppose this is the issue with a novelist who gets a lot of their effect from the sparky "waspishness" that Fowles noted about Amis, K: how much of it is egotism and how much of it baptism by fire for the human condition?

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

19:51 / 08.02.06

Apologies for the off-topic, but I've just been reading the F4J thread in Switchboard and now have the most marvellous mental image of Kingsley, reeling from his divorce, dressing up as Nick Fury and climbing Big Ben.

Saltation

20:28 / 16.02.06

>if anyone could divulge their views that would be helpful- a large part of The Green Man revolves around the egotistical prick-ness of the narrator.

i've had a go at 3 books by kingsley amis, working on the basis that the reputation must count for SOMEthing, and i have to say that i had exactly your reaction in each case. except i'd also throw in "passive-aggressive social-climbing brittle two-facedness".

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