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By JAMES PARKER | May 4, 2010

I won’t spoil it for you, though I will say that Amis pretty much spoiled it for me. Something in the gestation of The Pregnant Widow, which began life (so Amis has said) as a memoir, has messed it up: the prose feels murky, fugue-ish, as if the author had made the necessary descent into his preoccupations but then got stuck there, pulling sadly at his Wellington boot. I’ll grade it “Incomplete,” with the recommendation that if you’re looking for a perfected work of art, you cock an ear to Eagle Twin.

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ARTICLES BY JAMES PARKER

BIPOLAR BABIES: LEONARD COHEN AND ROD STEWART IN MISERY AND DELIGHT | December 05, 2012
"Every night and every morn," wrote William Blake one afternoon in 1803, "some to misery are born."

FINDING OUT WHAT MAKES THE MEAT PUPPETS TICK WITH A NEW ORAL HISTORY | May 30, 2012
As half-assed a form as it can be, the rock-band oral history is a folk form nonetheless, with a great claim to authenticity.

THEY AIN'T HEAVY, THEY'RE THE KIRKWOOD BROTHERS | May 31, 2012
Finding out what makes the Meat Puppets tick with a new oral history

GETTING TO KNOW PHILIP LARKIN WITH A NEW EDITION OF HIS POEMS | April 26, 2012
"A smash of glass and a rumble of boots/Electric trains and a ripped-up phonebooth/Paint-spattered walls and the cry of a tomcat/Lights going out, and a kick in the balls." These lines are not by Philip Larkin, of course — they're by Paul Weller.

BLACK SABBATH ARE BACK — IN PRINT AND ON FILM | November 14, 2011
The literature on Black Sabbath — already extensive — will continue to grow, as we try, try, try again to wrap our poor noggins around the irreducibly cosmic fact of this band.