The Second Plane: September 11: Terror and Boredom

"It was the advent of the second plane, sharking in low over the Statue of Liberty: that was the defining moment. Until then, America thought she was witnessing nothing more serious than the worst aviation disaster in history; now she had a sense of the fantastic vehemence ranged against her." (pg. 3)

From its opening lines, novelist Martin Amis' collection of essays and stories is concerned with the sensory experience and conceptual challenges of September 11, 2001, and with unpicking its sheer unfathomability. In tackling such a difficult topic, Amis is remarkably deft, steering away from every potential pitfall of mawkishness, polemic or unseemliness. Even in the short story 'The Last Days of Muhammad Atta', told from the perspective show more of one of the hijackers, he never submits to that false panacea of moral relativism into which so many of his peers sunk, and continue to wallow.

Indeed, Amis' surety only reminds you that there has been an alarming deficiency of quality cultural responses to this era-defining event, and when he laments on how the middle ground has moved over the years (pg. 198), it can be sobering to admit (there is an unremarked but ironical context in that the earlier pieces are published in the Guardian but the later ones in the Times, even though the author's outlook remains fundamentally the same). It makes you cherish anything that is genuinely trying to parse the events of that day, as opposed to the deluge of cant and emotiveness which colours most of our cultural discussion.

The essays and stories here are very readable, even when talking about impossibly harsh realities (when, for example, he asks in a review of the film United 93, was the last time you saw a commercial flight without any children on it?). Their conceptual lucidity and political sobriety (traits Amis shared with his good friend Christopher Hitchens) leads you to wonder if perhaps one of the greatest losses to our culture in the post-9/11 period has been the eclipse of the tough-minded old-school liberal lefties. Their hair-trigger-sensitive, identity-driven pseudo-academic heirs, the 'woke' progressive posturers, serve only to hammer home the defeat of that Tuesday morning again and again in their increasingly petty ways. In the afore-mentioned short story (pg. 121), Amis reproduces the recording of Muhammad Atta as he took command of the plane that he would soon pilot into the North Tower. "We have some planes," he says, to keep the worried passengers contained. They did not know the reality of the new world. They did not have the second plane; indeed, they had not yet experienced the first. "Just stay quiet, and you'll be okay." It was wrong then and it is wrong now. show less

This chronological collection of articles by Amis provides an insightful, incisive and informed overview of Islam, Islamism and the reaction of the West. Some will see it as overly reactionary, perhaps, owing to the author's growing belief that Islamism is an irrational death cult, akin to Nazism - but the arguments are well marshaled and the overview is persuasive. An occasional turn of phrase provides a visceral shock, and none are wasted. The emotional, political and psychological effects of the terrorist attacks of September are well accounted for here.

At times this book cuts close to the bone, but this collection of articles and short stories is measured look back at the events leading to September the 11th and its aftermath.

He sees very clearly, very well written, different than many of his other books, but
still very good. All still relavent

This volume is a collection of essays and short stories written in response to the 2001 terrorist attacks. Amis, a novelist and outspoken critic of radical Islam, addresses controversial aspects of religion and war. The collection does include "Bush in Yes-Man's Land," "The Wrong War," as well as two stores, including "The Last Days of Muhammad Atta." The essays are presented to us in the same order they were originally first published and do include some violence.

Includes the amazing short story 'In the Palace of the End' - well worth the price just for that.