One Fat Englishman by Kingsley Amis, winner of the Booker Prize, author of Stanley and The Women and more than ten other masterpieces http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/02/stanley-and-women-by-kingsley-amis-10.html - 10 out of 10

 One Fat Englishman by Kingsley Amis, winner of the Booker Prize, author of Stanley and The Women and more than ten other masterpieces http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/02/stanley-and-women-by-kingsley-amis-10.html  

10 out of 10

 

 

We find some astonishing things from the introduction to One Fat Englishman, signed by David Lodge – who is himself a magnificent writer, he has signed three magnum opera, one of the Campus Trilogy being http://realini.blogspot.com/2021/04/changing-places-and-golden-rule.html Changing Places - that shed light on the life of Kingsley Amis and the reflection it has had on the book, which anticipates some of the decline that the divine writer would experience in the later part of his life, when he has many shortcomings to share with the hero/anti-hero, the Fat Englishman from the title, Roger Micheldene…

 

Kingsley Amis would get very fat – his son, who is miracle onto himself, author of at least three chefs d’oeuvre, two of which I have read http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/the-information-by-martin-amis-is-first.html says in his memoirs about his father that http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/the-information-by-martin-amis-is-first.html 'getting fat was more like a project, repressive…It cancelled him out sexually '- and in a baffling turn of events, he would come to share the house with his first wife and her current husband, after he would have divorced the second, and there is a period in his life, when he had been invited in the United States (was it to Princeton?) and his observations there would have surely influenced this novel.

One Fat Englishman is in my top 150 best books and definitely one of the top 100 best comedies  http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world and the fact that the anti-hero is often (most of the time, or is it all the time) despicable does not diminish the value of the book for a number of reasons, albeit David Lodge explains in the introduction that he had initially considered it less impressive than some of the other established magnanimous works of Amis, because the main character is so abhorrent, but then he would change his mind later, and I see this as one example of what not to do, then there is the usual need to identify with the main player of the Glasperlenspiel, and it is much easier when he shares with you so many flaws and in the end, you are better than him.

 

The main attraction here would be the style, the incredible, glorious humor of Kingsley Amis – considered by critics to be one of the best writers of comedy of the last century – and there are examples from the life of the novelist that show he was hilarious there as well – he met with a Russian poet who asked  'you atheist' And Amis replied 'well, yes, but it's more that I hate him '- this is an Anarchic comedy and it starts with What's he like...not much sense of humor…He's a bit fiercely Danish…The Scandinavians are dear people but they've never been what you might call bywords for wit and sparkle, any more than the Germans’

Roger Michener works for a publishing house and he is in the USA, staying in New York, soon to embark for Britain, when he takes part in some felicitous and sometimes dramatic events, which start at the house of Joe Derlanger, a rather mild, affable, interesting man, who has a very dark side when it comes to anger…versus objects – we are assured that he is never aggressive towards humans, though he is quite hostile to his wife

 

At one moment, Joe has some feud with…his own car, and in spite of the efforts of those near, he keeps bashing the headlights, then takes a crowbar and smashes the windshield, after he had done much damage to the body, only to try and remember later, after the fact, what had prompted all this fury and destruction, with the conclusion that one wreck will be taken from the dumps and destroyed to try and see what must have happened…but apart from the attack on the car, there is trauma and abuse of people.

Indeed, this book would not be published in the age of cancel culture – or maybe in some shape, but not with mainstream intent – because so much is anathema in this new template, and if we condemn the actions of the protagonist, it does not mean we must not see what excess leads to and learn from the mistakes of others – Roger is obsessed with Helene Bang – the name may be a reference to the vulgar for coitus, but it could also have other intentions – and for some strange reasons, she accepts at least some of his advances, against the fact that she is married to Ernest, a much more decent fellow…

 

Nay, the last statement was wrong, Ernest is Romeo, when compared with One Fat Englishman anyway, for Roger is not just fat and objectionable physically ‘Of the seven deadly sins, Roger considered himself qualified in gluttony, sloth and lust, but distinguished in anger’ and his attitude is one of contempt, showing racist, anti-Semitic and other traits of character that make him persona non grata, and I would argue that this makes the talent of the author ever more admirable and marvelous, seeing as he can work with a loathsome on the majority of the pages and still make the whole project a miracle.

Michener is helped by a nemesis that seems to be no better, Irving Macher believed in ‘do what you want, any means are justifiable for getting what you want, up to and including murder’ and plans a series of tricks and traps to shame, humiliate his antagonist, from stealing the notes for a talk that the Fat Englishman has to deliver – but then vehemently refuses to do so, against the fact that he could improvise – to encouraging a young woman to entice the forty year old Roger, then bite and reject him.

‘In nomine Patris, now look, this isn't good enough…You know what I'm like and yet you keep on at me…’ this is part of a fight he constantly has with God, and there is also this aspect, that one tends to feel sorry for the nasty-hero, because he clearly suffers from a good many ills – I must be careful and warn you here that I am off a tangent, there are few comments on the notes I post, but the other day, a presumed Trump supporter was aghast at my reference to his idol, and here I go again, for the ‘very stable genius’ is in fact the paradigm of idiocy in my book, and speaking of shortcomings, the Fat Englishman is a god, when compared with the Fat Orange American – and one fells the poor man is fat, selfish, suffers from delusion of grandeur – just like his Fat American Counterpart – and at times he is so humiliated, defeated, in despair that he starts crying and readers must see that there is no more space to climb down, and if he deserves it, and he does, then there is the assessment that now that he has lost, we could pity him…Milan Kundera explains there is a difference between pity, which we feel for someone we see as inferior, and empathy, for those who are on our level http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-unbearable-lightness-of-being-9-put.html

 

The Revolutionary Realini signed this note; you can access the link to see the Newsweek article on the exploits

http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/realini-in-newsweek-participant-in.html