(2006), Martin Amis’s eleventh novel, is much shorter and more focused than his previous novel, the extravagant and elaborate

(2003), and, like his seventh novel,

(1991), it takes on one of the largest and most lethal catastrophes of the twentieth century. Where

engaged with the Shoah,

tackles the Gulag, like Amis’s nonfiction book

(2002), and aspires to an even larger subject: the nature of Russia. Where the protagonist of

, Odilo Unverdorben, is a Nazi doctor, the nameless narrator of

is a survivor of a Soviet labour camp and himself a perpetrator of rapes and killings. Where the narrative of

runs in reverse to the narrator’s birth, the…

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Citation: Tredell, Nicolas. "House of Meetings". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 05 July 2011 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=21689, accessed 19 April 2024.]