Article: Martins just a big SHOW-OFF; Too smart: Martin Amis has a habit of choosing the clever word rather than the right word.

Byline: Craig Brown

The Second Plane by Martin Amis Cape [pounds sterling]12.99 .[pounds sterling]12.99 inc p&p (0845 6064213)

Long ago, Martin Amis used his natural gifts for distortion and exaggeration toproduce extremely funny novels. Thirty years on, he still employs thedistortion and the exaggeration, but the humour has evaporated into thin air.Does this make him serious?

G.K. Chesterton once wrote that the opposite of funny is not serious; theopposite of funny, he said, is not funny. This kept coming into my head as Iread this collection of essays, reviews and short stories about 9/11 and itsaftermath. For many years now, Martin Amis has ...

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