{"product_id":"visiting-mrs-nabokov-and-other-excursions","title":"Visiting Mrs. Nabokov: And Other Excursions","description":"\u003cp\u003eA tantalizing collection of classic essays from one of the most gifted writers of his generation.  \"The brainy  sarcastic  tender intelligence at the center of these pieces can make you laugh out loud: they can also move you to tears.\" People  Martin Amis brings the same megawatt wit  wickedly acute perception  and ebullient wordplay that characterize his novels. He encompasses the full range of contemporary politics and culture (high and low) while also traveling to China for soccer with Elton John and to Londons darts-crazy pubs in search of the perfect throw.  Throughout  he offers razor-sharp takes on such subjects as:  American politics: \"If history is a nightmare from which we are trying to awake  then the Reagan era can be seen as an eight-year blackout. Numb  pale  unhealthily dreamless: eight years of Do Not Disturb.\"  Chess: \"Nowhere in sport  perhaps in human activity  is the gap between the tryer and the expert so astronomical.... My chances of a chess brilliancy are the chances of a lab chimp and a type writer producing King Lear.\"  \"His fascination with the observable world is utterly promiscuous: he will address a cathedral and a toilet seat with the same peeled-eyeball intensity.\"John Updike\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44968172748853,"sku":"ByrdShop_0679757937","price":60.37,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780679757931.jpg?v=1770648291","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/visiting-mrs-nabokov-and-other-excursions","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}