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Martin Amis
(1949-)

Active: 1973- in England, Britain, Europe

By Richard Todd (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam)

Indexing Data:

  • Active In: England, Britain, Europe
  • Born In: England, Britain, Europe
  • Activity: Novelist

Life, Works and Times

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Martin Amis was born in Oxford on 25 August 1949. The second of the three children of the writer Kingsley Amis and his then wife Hilary (Hilly) Bardwell, Martin Amis has consistently enjoyed the highest profile of the three. His brother Philip is barely a year older, and his younger sister, Sally, died aged 46 in December 2000. Amis family life during the 1950s was peripatetic. Most of it was based in South Wales, where Kingsley Amis taught at University College, Swansea, until the success ushered in by Lucky Jim made an academic career unnecessary. From an early point, Martin Amis was used to the domestic presence of prominent literary figures such as Philip Larkin. There were periods of residence in Spain (Mallorca, where Robe

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First published 17 November 2002 ; revised 23 October 2003

Citation: Todd, Richard. "Martin Amis". The Literary Encyclopedia. 17 November 2002.
[http://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=5097, accessed 21 November 2009.]