The Green Man

Rating:
Summary: A ghost story
Review: "The Green Man" is a ghost story. Maurice Allington owns and operates the Green Man Inn. It's supposed to be haunted, but ghosts haven't been seen since Victorian times.

Maurice spends most of his time avoiding the people in his life--his father, his emotionally detached wife, Joyce, and his lonely daughter, Amy. He does have time, however, to initiate a sexual relationship with Diana, the bored, talkative wife of the local doctor.

As Maurice begins increasingly detached from his domestic life, he begins to "see" things--including the ghost of Dr. Thomas Underhill--a 17th Century villian who may or may not committed 2 ghastly murders.

Unfortunately, no-one believes Maurice's sightings, and it does seem up for grabs whether or not Maurice is hallucinating or whether this is all just the result of Maurice's alcoholic binges.

Underhill seems to have a message for Maurice, and, unable to resist, Maurice takes the bait and begins to unravel the Underhill mystery in a detective style.

Maurice is a marvellous Amis character--lacking the self-deprecating humour and comic talents of Jim Dixon in "Lucky Jim," Maurice is weaker and not as likeable. Nonetheless, the hand of Amis is clearly visible.

The book was gripping at times and amusing at others. I laughed and laughed when Maurice attempts to set up "The Orgy" between Joyce, Diana, and, of course, himself! I loved the way he tried to introduce the subject to his wife--in spite of the fact that he receives ample warning signals to the contrary. If you enjoy this book, I can heartily recommend "Lucky Jim"--another brilliant Amis novel.

Rating:
Summary: A fanciful, fast-paced delight
Review: Amis' writing turns the most wretched characters into sympathetic and comic protagonists. This book is no exception. At its most superficial level, the plot is that of a very silly horror story. The elements of absurdity keep the pace quick, preventing us from consciously dwelling on the book's philosophical undertones. The result is a delightful cross between literary perfection and an episode of Scooby Doo.

This book would have made a perfect addition to a time capsule: on a number of levels, it brilliantly reflects the time in which it was written (the late 60's).

Rating:
Summary: A Faint Rustling in The Trees...
Review: Different people expect different things from works of supernatural fiction - some like plenty of bad-tempered fiends and flying gore a la Clive Barker, while others prefer the more ponderous, "what-if-it really-happened" feel of The X Files or the short stories of M.R. James. Amis' novel offers what is to my mind a much more satisfying kind of scare, one which involves a blurring of the lines between outer and inner malignancies - between our fear of the quiet rustlings and creaks that whisper through the walls of our homes, and that of the faint stirrings of even darker forces within our selves. The protagonist of this novel, Maurice Allington, is in many ways an attractive character - gregarious, witty and restless in the presence of fools - but he is also an abominably selfish and morally slovenly human being whose libidinal fantasies about the women in his life are forever in danger of creeping a little too close to the surface. These features of his character recommend him to the attention of an old inhbitant of the little country inn theat he manages - a philosopher, alchemist, and mystic who, in addition to having been dead for over two-hundred years, is in the position to make Maurice an offer that he may not be able to refuse... _The Green Man_ is full of scary scenes - ghostly arrivals, an excorcism, a confrontation with the dreadful, elemental monster of the title, and a truly unforgettable "interview with God" (the Devil? the Grim Reaper? It's hard to tell with the theologically intractable Amis). The climax of the novel is thoroughly satisfying, and reveals Amis to be something of an optimist about human nature, at least to the extent that he believes we are able to recoil from our most truly horrifying desires and shut the door on them before they break through the forest and tear apart our homes.

Rating:
Summary: Engaging reading
Review: I saw a movie of "The Green Man" on A&E a few years back, and it didn't make any damn sense (save for the brilliant casting of Albert Finney as Maurice Allington), so I read the book. Wow! It was a treat.

Maurice isn't the sort of man I would like, nor do I suspect he would like me, but somehow he works well as a narrator. The story engages on several levels: you spend much time debating (especially after Allington sees "God") whether we aren't simply privy to the pitiful delusions of a pill and alcohol gulping man on his last legs rather than dealing with the understatedly fiendish Dr. Underhill and his monstrous creation.

Who knows, and who cares? Great read.

Rating:
Summary: Engaging reading
Review: I saw a movie of "The Green Man" on A&E a few years back, and it didn't make any damn sense (save for the brilliant casting of Albert Finney as Maurice Allington), so I read the book. Wow! It was a treat.

Maurice isn't the sort of man I would like, nor do I suspect he would like me, but somehow he works well as a narrator. The story engages on several levels: you spend much time debating (especially after Allington sees "God") whether we aren't simply privy to the pitiful delusions of a pill and alcohol gulping man on his last legs rather than dealing with the understatedly fiendish Dr. Underhill and his monstrous creation.

Who knows, and who cares? Great read.

Rating:
Summary: Good Old-Fashioned Gothic Ghost Story
Review: I've never been much of a gothic horror fan, but The Green Man is a good old-fashioned gothic, without the ... cliche heroine having to get rescued by the hero. Maurice Allington has been chosen by the ghost of Dr. Underhill -- a sinister gentleman who practiced black magic and discovered how to beat death -- to become the enabler who brings Underhill back from beyond the grave.

Allington -- a boozer whose ghost-sightings are written off as hallucinations by just about everyone he knows -- is the proprietor of The Green Man, a small English inn. A pitiable character, Allington is going through somewhat of a mid-life crisis. He is mentally unstable, and much of the story convincingly shows us a man who is living on the borderline between a disappointing world that he can't handle sober, and a frighteningly confusing one in which he must remain in control lest he truly lose his mind.

Through snatches of conversations with the ghost of the Doctor and with a dashing young man who just so happens to be the embodiment of a bemused and slightly cynical God, Allington is brought to discover the power that both good and evil can wield from beyond the physical world that he knows.

I must warn you that I had some crazy dreams on nights that I stayed up late reading this book before bedtime. Much of the novel's suspense is psychological, and since Amis' formal style of writing can be cumbersome at times, you may find yourself reading passages two or three times to undertand fully the nuances and foreshadows within.

Rating:
Summary: Through a whisky glass, darkly
Review: In the early 1970s Amis seemed to be looking for a new direction. His initial series of comedies (_Lucky Jim_ and its successors in broadly similar mode) had begun bringing in diminishing returns, at least in terms of critical attention and sales. And later, in the 1980s, Amis found a different kind of form with _The Old Devils_ and his last books.

But at more or less the mid-point in his career Amis experimented with a series of genre novels. Of this series _The Alteration_ was science fiction (an alternate-worlds story in which the Reformation never happened), _The Riverside Murders_ is more or less in the English murder mystery tradition (that is, there is more interest in the puzzle than in the US crime novel, but at its best the English whodunnit is also more likely to give us human characters rather than groteques). _The Green Man_ is the last and most successful of the series, and is in the horror genre.

As a horror story "The Green Man" offers only mild chills, but its other rewards are substantial. It's a portrait of Maurice Allingham, drinker, womaniser and host of The Green Man, an English hotel with a fine table, excellent wine list, and a couple of picturesque ghosts, though with no recent sightings.

Maurice is both cynical and observant, yet he misses much of what is important of what goes on around him. The things he misses include sinister stirrings around him that indicate that the supernatural elements around him have not been so much extinct as dormant, and are now reawakening. More importantly he fails to observe almost everything of importance about those who are closest to him, his long(ish) suffering wife, his lonely, resentful teenage daughter, and his son, who has already moved on from him.

Though we are invited to see through Allingham's eyes, we are also given a portrait of Allingham, a man who has gone a long way on charm but is finding that trait not enough, any more, to stave off the consequences of various kinds of misbehaviour. With women he finds that they are still prepared to bed him, but they no longer seem to like him much. With his drinking he finds he can still lie to his doctor, but he cannot deny - at least to himself - the danger signs: shakes, mild strokes, visual and auditory hallucinations. And his teenage daughter still resents his absense from her life; but she is coming close to not minding any more.

Some critics have missed the strength and trenchancy of Amis' critique of his male narrators. Amis is often accused of misogyny for portrayals such as the women in "The Green Man", when in fact it is principally the narrator who Amis is mocking, not the women the narrator comments on.

This is the book that contains the famous "threesome" scene, in which the two women participants soon lose interest in the male narrator who believes he set up the scene. Maurice tries and fails to attract at least some attention, find a spare limb to involve himself with, and eventually gives up and gets dressed. The scene has been misread from time to time; it is probably not intended as a portrait of what Amis thinks must inevitably happen in a threesome, but rather a comic come-uppance for a character whose extreme selfishness, sexual and otherwise, is well delineated.

Both women then leave Maurice for good, showing in doing so considerably more strength or moral dignity than Maurice has yet managed. (There is a redemption, of sorts, towards the end of the book, when his attention is finally focussed, almst too late, on his daughter.) But Amis is, in most of his career (_Jake's Thing_ and _Stanley and the Women_ being exceptions) a more painful critic of male behaviour than of female.

Amis' use of the darker English folklore - the "Green Man" and "Thomas Underhill" myths - are also interestingly sinister. And the portrayal of "God" as a slightly camp, terribly urbane young man is one that has been hugely influential - in an unacknowledged way - in popular culture since "The Green Man" appeared.

By the way I think it clear that the supernatural events are "real". Maurice is not given his shakes and hallucinations to indicate that he is an unreliable observer in the manner of Henry James' governess in "The Turn of the Screw". The contrast is pointed, in fact, with an entertaining parody of James' prose style in the book. It is clear that Maurice does not "see things" in that sense or to quite that extent (in fact his trouble is that he does _not_ see things). Rather, Maurice's shakes, voices and palpitations mean that he will not be believed by his family, and he is forced to deal with things on his own.

This is a very fine comic novel, with mild horror and (as often with Amis) a little more depth than it pretends to.

Cheers!

Laon

Rating:
Summary: Through a whisky glass, darkly
Review: In the early 1970s Amis seemed to be looking for a new direction. His initial series of comedies (_Lucky Jim_ and its successors in broadly similar mode) had begun bringing in diminishing returns, at least in terms of critical attention and sales. And later, in the 1980s, Amis found a different kind of form with _The Old Devils_ and his last books.

But at more or less the mid-point in his career Amis experimented with a series of genre novels. Of this series _The Alteration_ was science fiction (an alternate-worlds story in which the Reformation never happened), _The Riverside Murders_ is more or less in the English murder mystery tradition (that is, there is more interest in the puzzle than in the US crime novel, but at its best the English whodunnit is also more likely to give us human characters rather than groteques). _The Green Man_ is the last and most successful of the series, and is in the horror genre.

As a horror story "The Green Man" offers only mild chills, but its other rewards are substantial. It's a portrait of Maurice Allingham, drinker, womaniser and host of The Green Man, an English hotel with a fine table, excellent wine list, and a couple of picturesque ghosts, though with no recent sightings.

Maurice is both cynical and observant, yet he misses much of what is important of what goes on around him. The things he misses include sinister stirrings around him that indicate that the supernatural elements around him have not been so much extinct as dormant, and are now reawakening. More importantly he fails to observe almost everything of importance about those who are closest to him, his long(ish) suffering wife, his lonely, resentful teenage daughter, and his son, who has already moved on from him.

Though we are invited to see through Allingham's eyes, we are also given a portrait of Allingham, a man who has gone a long way on charm but is finding that trait not enough, any more, to stave off the consequences of various kinds of misbehaviour. With women he finds that they are still prepared to bed him, but they no longer seem to like him much. With his drinking he finds he can still lie to his doctor, but he cannot deny - at least to himself - the danger signs: shakes, mild strokes, visual and auditory hallucinations. And his teenage daughter still resents his absense from her life; but she is coming close to not minding any more.

Some critics have missed the strength and trenchancy of Amis' critique of his male narrators. Amis is often accused of misogyny for portrayals such as the women in "The Green Man", when in fact it is principally the narrator who Amis is mocking, not the women the narrator comments on.

This is the book that contains the famous "threesome" scene, in which the two women participants soon lose interest in the male narrator who believes he set up the scene. Maurice tries and fails to attract at least some attention, find a spare limb to involve himself with, and eventually gives up and gets dressed. The scene has been misread from time to time; it is probably not intended as a portrait of what Amis thinks must inevitably happen in a threesome, but rather a comic come-uppance for a character whose extreme selfishness, sexual and otherwise, is well delineated.

Both women then leave Maurice for good, showing in doing so considerably more strength or moral dignity than Maurice has yet managed. (There is a redemption, of sorts, towards the end of the book, when his attention is finally focussed, almst too late, on his daughter.) But Amis is, in most of his career (_Jake's Thing_ and _Stanley and the Women_ being exceptions) a more painful critic of male behaviour than of female.

Amis' use of the darker English folklore - the "Green Man" and "Thomas Underhill" myths - are also interestingly sinister. And the portrayal of "God" as a slightly camp, terribly urbane young man is one that has been hugely influential - in an unacknowledged way - in popular culture since "The Green Man" appeared.

By the way I think it clear that the supernatural events are "real". Maurice is not given his shakes and hallucinations to indicate that he is an unreliable observer in the manner of Henry James' governess in "The Turn of the Screw". The contrast is pointed, in fact, with an entertaining parody of James' prose style in the book. It is clear that Maurice does not "see things" in that sense or to quite that extent (in fact his trouble is that he does _not_ see things). Rather, Maurice's shakes, voices and palpitations mean that he will not be believed by his family, and he is forced to deal with things on his own.

This is a very fine comic novel, with mild horror and (as often with Amis) a little more depth than it pretends to.

Cheers!

Laon

Rating:
Summary: A literate, reflective horror story
Review: Not a horror novel in the traditional sense of the term, but instead a rather quiet, brooding examination of the nature of evil and moral choice. Philosophical and at times rather funny, The Green Man should be of especial interest to those readers who normally shy away from the horror genre.

Rating:
Summary: A GREEN MAN AND PINK ELEPHANTS
Review: Some of the best and most entertaining fiction by Kingsley Amis is comparatively little known, and I am pleased to see The Green Man available here and there. It has his usual virtues of offbeat humour, a gift for atmosphere, an engaging show of fogeyishness and some really memorable writing; and it has his occasional traits of implausibility, lapses of concentration and discursiveness, which I sometimes find irritating and sometimes entertaining depending on what mood I am in.

This is a distinctly original ghost story. Whether or not Amis found the basic inspiration for his green man in legends, or in The Golden Bough, or in other fiction I have no idea. I can't think of a similar creature in similar literature that I have come across, perhaps simply because there is no similar literature. The thread of the preternatural does not dominate the narrative, which is largely concerned with the interactions between the narrator and his family and acquaintances. The story is told by an alcoholic publican, remarkably lucid and vigorous for the most part, and opinionated and prejudiced in a way that suggests to me that the author had put some of himself into the character. He is the only character in the book who is drawn in the round, but his alcohol-dependency is not investigated in any depth, simply treated as a necessity to the plot. He is bored, grumpy and dissatisfied - familiar enough Amis themes - and predictably in search of sexual, if not precisely emotional, interest outside his rather flat and uninvolving marriage. To me, he is not completely convincing. He is rather grandly detached and above-it-all for someone with such a massive and corrosive problem of his own, but that is not the sort of quibble I would expect to bother Amis.

The real reason for the alcoholic theme is that the author is being a bit of an old tease. Allington, the publican, sees some pretty amazing things, and we are supposed to be left wondering to what extent they are objectively real and to what extent drink-induced delusions. For the most part they were real for me, and I believe real from the author's standpoint too, until the latter stages of the book. Here I detect a touch of wheel-slip - I simply think Amis is losing the plot a little, a suspicion confirmed by the way he winds up the narration in a slightly perfunctory manner. It's a fine story for all that. It will certainly appeal to his aficionados in general if they have not yet got around to it, and if you acquire it for a 5-or-6-hour flight or train journey on a caveat lector basis, I shall be disappointed if you are disappointed.