Society and Sexuality in Martin Amis's the Rachel Papers

Martin Amis's The Rachel Papers, a scatological künstlerroman framed after James Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, traces the journey of an adolescent male on the verge of his second decade of living. His expedition through the realms of society and sexuality give rise, at the end of the novel, to a budding artist. By his frame of reference, every moment in his life should be documented and cross-referenced to maximize all experience. Although intelligent, Charles Highway's textured living borders a level of insanity in which details are the ultimate force of control. His finely shaped life leads to misgivings, sufferings, and an astute knowledge of himself. Charles Highway's peculiar actions fortify the theory that society shapes a person's attributes; Charles is a prime example of extremism.

Society has a way of shaping personalities and their actions. Charles Highway is a great example of how society affects social interactions and interpersonal relationships. He defines himself at the moment of first meeting as "I am nineteen years of age, and twenty tomorrow" (3). He continues by explaining that turning twenty is a crucial period in one's life and also that at the instant he becomes twenty, he will find a new definition of himself. While attempting to aid this self-discovery, Charles searches through his papers, a group of cross-referenced and obsessive documents about his life, to "sort out all my precocity and childishness, my sixth-form cleverness and fifth-form nastiness, all the self-consciousness and self-disgust and self-infatuation and self-...you name it, perhaps I'll be able to locate my hamartia and see what kind of grown-up I shall make" (4). He ultimately is trying to discover his hamartia, his tragic flaw, which he believes will be the telltale sign of his maturation. One part of his journey is taken from a assemblage of papers that contributed to the title of the novel. "A sea of pads, folders, envelopes, napkins, notes, the complete Rachel Papers" (57). According to Charles, Rachel was the last person he dealt with on the night of his supposed transformation. Somewhere along Charles's trek through life, a thought entered his head that his entire thoughts, happenings, and existence should be filed for future use. This idea stems from society's rule that experience is the epitome of knowledge. His filings and reports even include an "Anxiety Top Ten" which is written, by Charles, on a weekly basis:

ANXIETY TOP TEN. Week ending September 26^th

(Last week's positions in brackets)

(-) 1. Clap

(1) 2. Rachel

(2) 3. Big Boy

(7) 4. Loose Molar

(10) 5. Owing Norm Money

(3) 6. Bronco

(6) 7. Being Friendless

(9) 8. Insanity

(-) 9. Rotting Feet

(4) 10. Pimple in Left Nostril

(92)

This list also includes the item's position the previous week. It is considered healthy to talk about one's problems, as well as keeping a diary of one's thoughts, yet even this roster of weekly dilemmas surpasses society's quasi-regulations. Consequently, Charles's anal ways do not end here. To make everything perfect for the first time Rachel is to visit, Charles adjusts his room to suggest certain things about himself.

As I dressed I thought about the setting up of the room. I couldn't be slapdash as I had been with Gloria. It was a hundred to one that I wouldn't get her [Rachel] even into the house, but all the same everything had to be...just so...Not knowing her view on music I decide to play it safe; I stacked the records upright in two parallel rows; at the head of the first I put 2001: A Space Odyssey (can't be wrong); at the head of the second I put, after some thought, a selection of Dylan Thomas's verse, read by the poet. Kleenex well away from the bed: having them actually on the bedside chair was tantamount to a poster reading 'The big thing about me is that I wank a devil of a lot.' ... After a quarter of an hour I decide on a Jane Austin, the mellow Persuasion, face down, open towards the end, by my pillow. The little touch/That means so much. (43-44)

His mechanical ways suggest something unnatural about Charles. His movements too planned; his ideas too automated. Society seems to have shaped Charles into a makeshift robot that plays out the extremity of its rules to see if the regulations are overtly fake.

Culture finalizes Charles Highway's every thought in an extreme form. Society plays romanticism in many off-beat and over-dramatic ways. Charles picks up on this kind of subconscious melodramatic emission and inflates it to sexualize and win over adolescents who also have this artificial romantic perspective. He simplifies the matter of sex as thus: "Firstly, I assume I'm right in saying that teenage sex is quite different from post-teenage sex? It's not something you do, just something you get done. The over-twenties, I grant you, must see it largely as a matter of obligation, too: but obligation to the partner, not to oneself, like us" (18). There again he creates a barrier between the teenage years and the twenties years. This also explains his behavior; he is trying to satisfy himself as much as possible before he reaches the point of sex for obligation purposes only. Yet he is so meticulous when it does come to sex each movement is planned and follows a self-maintained set of rules. Charles works his partner in phases:

Now, as an opener, I decided to try something rather ambitious. I rose, poured out drinks, held her [Rachel's] eye as we sipped, took her glass away. You really need to be six foot tall for this, but I gave it a go anyway: knelt on the floor in front of her, reached out and cupped her cheeks, urged her face towards mine...No good, not tall enough, she has to buckle inelegantly, breasts on thighs. Rise to a crouch, start work on ears, neck, only occasionally skimming lips across hers. Then, when leg begins to give way, I do not churlishly flatten her on to the sofa nor shoo her downstairs: I pressure her to the floor, half beside half on top of me. (150)

These set actions bind his beloved and long-sought Rachel. His mannerisms then extend into a second phase of movements. He continues this way throughout the entire sexual act. Charles Highway's sexual life is just as how he separated it: in the teenage years it is done to be done.

Charles Highway is definitely an experimental robot of society. He knows how he should act, but lacks the emotions that accompany the desired reaction. At the conclusion of the novel, Charles ends his relationship with Rachel. "Rachel gave me a fierce look over her tissue, and it occurred to me that I had better start crying too. But that would create more problems than it would solve" (223). Charles is oblivious to emotions, he only sees this as a casualty in his war for maturation. He seeks experience and finds it, but it is missing the coupled feelings. But, again, he is only the creation of society.

Works Cited

Amis, Marten. The Rachel Papers. New York: Vintage, 1973.