Take a Girl Like You by Kingsley Amis – one of Realini’s Best 100 Novels http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world? 10 out of 10

 Take a Girl Like You by Kingsley Amis – one of Realini’s Best 100 Novels http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world?

10 out of 10

 

 

Kingsley Amis is one of the three best authors for the undersigned, who has been elated by Lucky Jim (which is included on the All-TIME 100 Best Novels list), Ending Up, Girl, 20, Stanley and The Women, The Old Devils, The Anti-Death League and now this superb, exhilarating, perfect Magnum opus if you ask me http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/05/lucky-jim-by-kingsley-amis.html

 

This is not a novel that modern day audiences would cherish, especially if they are ‘Woke’, in which case they probably would not just dismiss the masterpiece, but condemn or ban it outright, given the position of the male lead, Patrick Standish, who would serve well the role of anti-hero, the villain in a saga of the present, because of his position as predator – as the heroine of the narrative will put it, quoting the nemesis of that moment, he is the type to ‘eat and take all and pay for nothing’, something to that effect, which the hero had used as sarcasm for Dick Thompson, to highlight the habit the latter had of drinking and eating, while evading any expense- the type that wants to have sex and no commitments…

Jenny Bunn comes from the North of Britain, where people have different values – they used to have, there are changes now, whereas decades ago, most had been devoted to Labor, in recent elections, they have bought into the Boris promises of ‘leveling up’, taking Brexit to mean greatness and we will have to see if many less qualified workers will stay Conservative in the future, if they like the heavy partying of their lead man, it might happen – and she is surprised to see her new entourage concerned almost exclusively with themselves, their pleasures, getting what they want and discarding what others feel and desire…

 

Right from her arrival in the new town, Jenny meets Patrick Standish – this reader is enchanted by this chef d’oeuvre (just like he had been with the other about ten books by the same Magister Ludi) in large part because he identifies with the protagonist, without having had his charm, intellect, spontaneity, wit, chutzpah, there had been about the same dilemmas and the serial attempts to have intercourse…I am writing my memoirs and try and explain (largely to myself, for there is and probably will never be an audience) how on earth could I have had coitus with around two thousand women, given the lack of promise, character strengths, celebrity and indeed the list is too long to keep at it here

Patrick has had an affair with Anna le Page, the French girl who is renting a room at the same address, where Dick and Martha Thompson are proprietors – disclosure coming…Anna is not in fact French, she puts up an act, which helps her cover identity, she allows herself some attitudes that could not be tolerated were she to move in these circles as a ‘native’, she would not have the courage for her acts, such as the attempt to get intimate with Jenny, who is ‘straight’ and appalled at the sexual advances coming from a girl…

 

Patrick wants to copulate with Jenny – and any other attractive female that comes his way and would allow it, indeed, at one point he is so savage, unscrupulous, abominable as to take advantage of the inebriation of his victim and have carnal relations without her consent, which could not be given, seeing as she is almost unconscious and anyway, not in a position to know her own mind, or anything else for that matter…the potion taken today might not be perfect, it seems that male, female and other would have to have a legal document, notarized and stamped by various authorities which states the sex they will have, probably some of the details or all, which type is accepted, for how long, but what happened in the old days is also atrocious and constituted abuse from males – alas, I took advantage of the position in the society of our time and acted as a male chauvinist pig at times, while at other I would like to boast that I had been ahead of my time, practicing cunnilingus in a period when ‘Man’ was on the top of the game, he asked and got pleasure, obedience, he did not concern himself with the other, almost never…

Jenny is awed by this attractive, dazzling, seductive, intelligent, pleasant (and we could add so much more here) Casanova, who invites her out, pretends he has to be home because his mother calls, when in fact this is a stratagem to get the new girl where he wants her, use some foreplay and then get to ‘business’, but this is not what she has in mind, for she is a virgin – it does not happen in the book, but the Devil in the Backlands here -incidentally, there is a magnificent Opus magnum The Devil to Pay in the Backlands by Joao Guimaraes Rosa http://realini.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-devil-to-pay-in-backlands-by-joao.html - had a scheme for situations when the desired partner was a virgin and wanted to keep the status, telling them all right, there are these options, in my view, and then present the case of ‘alternative fornication’, that is means through which we could (try to) achieve catharsis, without changing the status quo, through the ‘back door’, or…you get my meaning, and if you do not…ask me

 

Jenny and Patrick are engaged in what may seem like a cat and mouse affair, where he is too affected by The Coolidge Effect (again, google this or just put a question in comments) and wants to jump on almost all the prey that looks amenable (reminding me of my young and resent self) there is a scene in which they meet Julian and Wendy, and Patrick is so quickly aroused that he starts after the first few minutes to kiss and initiate a sort of foreplay, on the premises of the mansion where they are guests, and Jenny sees this and is infuriated, they would clash, but the man will say that ‘what she wants does not exist, the men that would marry and wait for sex after it, are not that good (if at all) in bed, while the eithers philander’ or some words like these…there are many amusing episodes, sublime Kingsley Amis has been named the best writers of comedies of the last half of the Twentieth Century

For this reader, Take a Girl Like You is the Perfect book, in that it has mirth enough to last for another dozen reads or so, without being shallow, this is not a collection of anecdotes and jokes, on the contrary, there is quite enough inside to solicit another embrace, there are quite a few passages in there that I have not grasped and at times went back to extract the meaning, or even had to pass on the section, for the benefit of a fluent Flow http://realini.blogspot.com/2016/10/flow-by-mihaly-csikszentmihalyi-this-is.html and knowing full well that this will be placed on the read again list, together with other Kingsley Amis masterpieces

 

http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/07/ending-up-by-kingsley-amis.html

http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/02/stanley-and-women-by-kingsley-amis-10.html

http://realini.blogspot.com/2019/05/the-old-devils-by-kingsley-amis-97-out.html

http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/07/girl-20-by-astounding-kingsley-amis.html

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