Writers of Today; Kingsley Amis
- Series
- Writers of Today
- Episode
- Kingsley Amis
- Producing Organization
- Potomac Films
- Contributing Organization
- Library of Congress (Washington, District of Columbia)
- AAPB ID
- cpb-aacip/512-9g5gb1z98c
- NOLA Code
- WROT
If you have more information about this item than what is given here, or if you have concerns about this record, we want to know! Contact us, indicating the AAPB ID (cpb-aacip/512-9g5gb1z98c).
- Description
- Episode Description
- The British novelist and poet Kingsley Amis, interviewed by Robert Richman, director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts, discusses the writers who have influenced his work, including Graves and Fielding. Mr. Amis, who says he does not consider himself a social commentator, talks at length about the importance of language in both his novels and his poems. More than half the episode is devoted to Mr. Amis' readings from his own works. He reads the poem "Sight Unseen," written upon his arrival in the United States, and excerpts from his novel Lucky Jim and from an unfinished novel to be entitled Song of the Wanderer. Kingsley Amis, despite his dislike of the label, is considered one of the leading figures of England's group of writers known as the "Angry Young Men." Born in lower middle class circumstances in England in 1922, he attended the City of London School until 1941, when he entered the army. He completed his service in 1945, entered St John's College of Oxford University, and graduated in 1947. Of his writing career he says, "It just seemed to happen. I never said to myself, 'I'm going to be a writer.'" Nevertheless, his literary career had an early start. His first story, dramatically titled "The Sacred Rhino of Uganda," was published when Amis was eleven. After leaving Oxford he had a number of works published in such British periodicals as Encounter, The Spectator, Twentieth Century, and Essays in Criticism. In 1955 he won the Somerset Maugham Award- -- and, ironically, it was Maugham who shortly thereafter fired the first volley in the attack on Amis and the Angry Young Men, referring to them scornfully as "white collar proletariats." Happily for Amis, some of the more important critics have found considerable merit in his work. Edmund Wilson wrote in The New Yorker, "The picture of the surly, overgrown adolescent scuffing his heels at society simply doesn't fit this young author, whose novels Lucky Jim and That Uncertain Feeling have won him a reputation in Great Britain and the United States as a satirist writing in the same general tradition as Evelyn Waugh ."According to the New Statesman and Nation, "Amis has an unwaveringly merciless eye for the bogus He is a novelist of formidable and uncomfortable talent." And the London Times Literary Supplement critic, reviewing That Uncertain Feeling, said, "His dialogue is brilliant, his timing of comic situations could hardly be bettered. Yet by intention he is a serious comic writer--one who apparently means to say something about society." Since 1919 Amis has been teaching English at the University College of Swansea in Wales. He says his hobbies are jazz records, television, the cinema, and science fiction. (Biographical data from Current Biography Yearbook, 1958) Episode Running Time: 29:00 (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
- Series Description
- Designed to explore the important literary expressions of outstanding contemporary authors, Writers of Today is a series of filmed interviews with novelists, poets, and dramatists. The interviews concentrate on the goals, abilities, and preferences of the writers, their reasons for writing, how and what they write, and the background and environmental influences on their particular modes of expression. Writers of Today consists of 17 half-hour episodes that were distributed by NET in four different seasons in 1956-1957, 1959-1960, 1962, and 1963. The first season was seven episodes, and every subsequent season included some episodes from the previous seasons and some new episodes. The fact that episodes were repeated multiple times and there was no consistent numbering of episodes between seasons makes it difficult to create logical or accurate episode numbers, which is why there are not any episode numbers in these records. (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
- Broadcast Date
- 1962-00-00
- Asset type
- Episode
- Genres
- Talk Show
- Topics
- Literature
- Media type
- Moving Image
- Credits
-
-
Guest: Amis, Kingsley
Host: Richman, Robert
Producer: Read, Nicholas
Producing Organization: Potomac Films
- AAPB Contributor Holdings
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2341699-1 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Copy: Access
Color: B&W
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2341699-2 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Master
Color: B&W
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2341699-3 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Master
Color: B&W
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2341699-4 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Master
Color: B&W
If you have a copy of this asset and would like us to add it to our catalog, please contact us.
- Citations
- Chicago: “Writers of Today; Kingsley Amis,” 1962-00-00, Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed December 23, 2024, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-9g5gb1z98c.
- MLA: “Writers of Today; Kingsley Amis.” 1962-00-00. Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. December 23, 2024. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-9g5gb1z98c>.
- APA: Writers of Today; Kingsley Amis. Boston, MA: Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-9g5gb1z98c