$$$ and the Actor

'...Some of those moneymen might have been legit. There might be some dough around at the end of this.'

'You don't understand. The  money men didn't have any money either. It's clear what they were.'

I looked at him until he said,

'They were all actors.' (pg. 332)

In the cathartic ending of Martin Amis' Money, protagonist John Self begins to realize how many people in his life were simply acting as various roles. Both films, Good and Bad Money, don't actually exist. Fielding Goodney has manipulated Self into signing various contracts that are really various loans and debts; and he's also been the mystery caller, Frank (and thus, it is implied that Goodney is also the red-headed transvestite who has been following Self). Returning, dejected and broke to London, Self also discovers that Barry isn't his father at all; his father is Fat Vince. 

All of these things are amplified by the general impression throughout the novel that John Self wants to escape from the world of the book. At various points in the novel he addresses the reader mournfully, making statements that make our world/mentalities as far less base, less pornographic. There is something outside of his world that we as readers know, but that he cannot. It's also interesting to note that since this is a suicide note, Self dies when the story ends (at least to us he does). Self says at one point that his journey has "no destination, only an end.". He's experiencing conflict between a desire to explain his past and his present, and his desire to leave this world. How impressive then, when Amis shows the reader that his past and present worlds are merely scenes being fabricated by various part-time actors; while Self has believed himself to be in control of the money and people around him, its clear that he is the one who has been the most manipulated.

80's Commodity Culture and Money

"...everything and anything connected with mass entertainment and communication is skewered. John's hyperbolic representation of his pornographic "hobbies" as stressing "the element of lone gratification" (67) has, however, a serious side. The text's allusions to George Orwell's 1984 not-so-subtly underline the ways in which "[i]n the mass-mediated commodity culture where Self has temporarily thrived, advertising and film" have, like Orwell's Occania, reduced "human freedom and choice by steadily narrowing the range of thought" (Diedrick 100)." (pg.4)

“The process [of mass-media deception] has to be conscious, or it would not be carried out with sufficient precision, but it also has to be unconscious, or it would bring with it a feeling of falsity and hence of guilt.... To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies all this is indispensably necessary.” George Orwell (1984)

In the essay, Gendered Money Drabble, James Miracky attempts to uncover the different modes of cultural interpretation from two books written in Thatcher-era UK. One of the more interesting elements he talks about in his essay is that of the influence of 1980's social and economic forces. In Money, there are a few of these forces that are distinctly referenced or focused on by John Self; first the ways in which England has become a 'less intense' America, and secondly the cultural A.D.D. that so often captivates our narrator. 

The cultural mingling of America and the UK is present on several levels in Money. Self was born in the UK but grew up in New Jersey and London, making him an apt observer for the cultural shifts that have taken place in both societies. His hedonistic jaunts around both of these major metropolises also serve to represent the ways in which consumer culture have simply made London a somewhat less intense New York. He's able to satisfy his appetites in essentially the same ways wherever he is, and at certain points the cities seem so similar that we need street names and local accents to remind us where we are. 

The Orwellian idea of the "unconscious mass media deception" is also very clearly depicted in the novel. Self, who has experience in both advertising and film, understands the ways to make products, stories and people appealing. He sees the old naked shell of Lorne Guyland, a film icon, and cannot bring himself to truthfully respond to his question "Is this the body of an old man?". He understands what kinds of characters sell, and how to make a Pork-Roll tv dinner look like a sex banquet (at least on screen). But while Self is a conspirator in this deception, he is also very much lost in the sensory overload of mass media. He is bombarded by blips of information from all around the world to the point where he can't seem to mediate any form of appropriate response; in its place, Self responds with a kind of cynical humor. While this form of response seems fairly nonchalant, it is clear that this sensory bombardment is leaving John without any real information, or means of understanding it.This to me is best depicted on page 332 where Self speaks to the reality of television; 

"Television is working on us. Film is. We're not sure how yet. We wait, and count the symptoms. There's a realism problem, we all know that. TV is real! some people think. And where does that leave reality? Everyone must have, everyone demands their vivid personalities, their personal soap opera, street theatre, everyone must have some art in their lives..."

Funny Money

"There," I heard Vron whisper. The final double spread disclosed Vron on her knees, her gartered rump hoisted towards camera, splaying the busy cleft with magenta bladed fingers. Now I recognized her: Veronica, the talented stripper, here at the Shakespeare. 

Vron started to cry. My father gazed at me manfully. I believe there was a tear or two in his eyes also.

"I'm...I'm so proud," said Vron.

My father inhaled richly and rose to his feet. He slapped a hand on the cocktail console. He said explanatorily, 'Pink champagne. Well, it's not every day, is it? Come on Vron! Who's a silly then? Here's looking at you, my love.' He flexed his nose indulgently. 'There you go, John.'

'Vron? Barry?' I said, '--Cheers.' pg. 141

In this scene, Amis is employing several different elements of humor. In terms of opposing scripts, there's two very distinct realities in this scene that are at odds with each other. We have the obvious reality of Vron posing in a low-rate nudie magazine, Deboniar, which even John claims is 'targeted at the manual workers handjob' (pg.140). Then we have a distinct sense of pride all about; Vron believes this is her foray into the artistic world, Barry seems to be simply overjoyed and John (while clearly understanding that this is in no way 'art') who can't help but congratulate the two. There are a few ways in which these two opposing realities are being set at odds with each other. In the full paragraph, there's a fair amount of anaphora, or repetition of words; "Vron on a" "Vron lying" "Vron crouching", which sets up the visual elements of her debaucherous photoshoot. The dramatic emotional responses of pride and joy from Vron and Barry act as a hyperbole of sorts when compared with Johns blank and clinical description of the spread. There's also a more basic level of opposition present in this; a single meaning interpreted in two different ways. The single meaning would be that Vron has sold her naked image as porno for cash. Barry and Vron think of this as a step up the rungs of the ladder to some form of stardom, and John (while its not clear exactly what he thinks of Vron) sees the photographs for what they are, but can't really say what he thinks. The basic dynamics of the scene are fairly ridiculous as well; a father pridefully showing his son the naked images of his beau, and his beau weeping with pride at this display.