The New Unpleasantness

[dillingworth]

Perhaps not the forum for it but here's a short essay.


The New Unpleasantness

Martin Amis has frequently been heralded as the symbol of a new movement for the post-modern era, "The New Unpleasantness". What does this movement stand for and what - if any - are its lessons for a world so thoroughly schooled in pleasantries?

The New Unpleasantness is not a celebration of Unpleasantness per se, but rather a rebellion against all that is unpleasant about Pleasantness. It stands not for mere churlishness or, worse, the unbearable artifice of Grumpy Old Mannishness, but recognizes all that is wrong with modern life and with moderns who insist on being alive in particular. Aware of the temptation to give in to sarcasm or anger - always the easy way out - the New Unpleasant ingeniously sublimates it to something higher. In Amis's case this impulse manifests itself aesthetically and finds expression in the well-rounded epithet, the poisonous put-down, the acerbic anecdote. This, we might argue, is a trait he actually inherited from his father. In a famous example, even God himself is not exempt. Amis Senior once visited King's College Chapel (of all places) with Yevgeny Yevtushenko (of all people). Amidst the medieval splendour the following exchange took place:

YY: You atheist?
KA: Well, yes, but it's more that I hate him.

A fine example: the New Unpleasant is not one to let such ontological hurdles as denying the existence of the idol he sets up as the object of his hate stand in his way. When confronted with the horns of such a dilemma, the New Unpleasant whips out the eight-bore and shoots the bull dead. He is likewise without qualms in appreciating at a safe distance the unreality, and hence the comedy, inherent in almost any outrage on which the popular press turn their attention. It would be distasteful here to mention specific examples; it will do to say that anything save atrocities, natural disasters and disease look very different, and depress far less, from the standpoint of the New Unpleasant. Just as we all laugh at the sufferings of the clown in any sitcom because his pain is framed behind a protective screen of reassuring unreality, so the New Unpleasantness demands we view life itself within the same frame. Life in the flesh is often too unpleasant to contemplate in any seriousness; far from an escape, laughter affirms such unpleasantness whilst also refusing to be daunted by it.

But the New Unpleasantness is not restricted solely to the creation of insults and bon mots, however deft their logic-defying acrobatics might be. Nor is it merely confined to philosophizing on the nature of laughter; it also manifests itself in something of an ethical code. Whilst like every decent person he spurns all that is vulgar or obscene, the New Unpleasant is equally averse to anything liable to fall into that middle ground between the obviously good and the blatantly evil, namely the pleasant. Just as Amis Senior denied God's existence whilst lavishing him with his hatred, so the New Unpleasant denies the existence of pleasantness whilst setting himself out to destroy its phantom appearances in the consciousness of others. Though he is scrupulous in his observation of common decency, the New Unpleasant refuses stubbornly to submit himself to anything which is to be done for the sake of appearance or, worse, to reassure the doer that they are not after all irremediably useless as a human being. Into this category fall acts such as the exhibition of anything more than a reasonable degree of concern over the traumas liable to befall the less stable of one's friends; and the irritating conversational habit of throwing back grotesquely amplified any emotion one's interlocutor claims at that moment to feel. Under the New Unpleasantness, empathy has been dethroned; in a bloody but ultimately beneficial coup, independence of mind has taken its place. Hence a code arises which recognizes, for example, the right of every individual to spend extended periods of time alone, not as an expression of some extravagant grief or sign of pitiful derangement, but simply because other people are all very well at times but at others should be left well alone.

Amis Junior perhaps explains the movement best in his own words: two quotations placed in dialogue with each other amply illustrate the New Unpleasantness in all its well-aimed and redeeming malice:

If at any moment nothing might matter, who says nothing didn't matter already?

If you laugh at it, it evens things out, makes it easier to live with.

[Wabznasm]

Dill

Good little piece.

One thing I often find slightly odd (but still rather appealing) in MA is his mixture of laddishness and snobbery.

There's an article quite similar to this in a review by David Lodge in one of his essay books - either 'Write On' or 'Working with Structuralism' (which is very good). Have a peek.

I agree with most of what's said here - it's sort of like a cross between French existentialism and The Movement, isn't it?

Good read

[camus]

for a world so thoroughly schooled in pleasantries?

You lost me right there.

not as an expression of some extravagant grief or sign of pitiful derangement, but simply because other people are all very well at times but at others should be left well alone.

Or in fact because, there is more often than not an underlying element to all, and this element will inevitably raise it's ugly head at some point in a human relationship. Become a monk, release all, or be a hypocrite. Either a well informed "intelligent" hypocrite or an misinformed idiotic hypocrite.

There isn't really much more...

cheers
Kris