The age of horrorism

Featured in

  • Published 20061205
  • ISBN: 9780733319396
  • Extent: 266 pp
  • Paperback (234 x 153mm)

IT WAS MID-OCTOBER 2001, and night was closing in on the border city of Peshawar, in Pakistan, as my friend – a reporter and political man of letters – approached a market stall and began to haggle over a batch of t-shirts bearing the likeness of Osama bin Laden. It is forbidden to depict the human form in Sunni Islam, lest it lead to idolatry, but here was Osama’s lordly visage, on display and on sale right outside the mosque. The mosque now emptied after evening prayers, and my friend was very suddenly and very thoroughly surrounded by a shoving, jabbing, jeering brotherhood: the young men of Peshawar.

At this time of day, their equivalents in the great conurbations of Europe and America could expect to ease their not very sharp frustrations by downing a lot of alcohol, by eating large meals with no dietary restrictions, by racing around to one another’s apartments in powerful and expensive machines, by downing a lot more alcohol as well as additional stimulants and relaxants, by jumping up and down for several hours on strobe-lashed dance floors, and (in a fair number of cases) by having galvanic sex with near-perfect strangers. These diversions were not available to the young men of Peshawar.

Already a subscriber? Sign in here

If you are an educator or student wishing to access content for study purposes please contact us at griffithreview@griffith.edu.au

Share article

About the author

Martin Amis

Martin Amis is regarded by many critics as one of the most influential and innovative voices in contemporary British fiction. He was educated in...

More from this edition

The bridge

FictionAnd now, what's going to happen to us without barbarians?They were, those people, a kind of solution.C.P. Cavafy, Waiting for the BarbariansI AM THE...

The sublime nature of politics

GR OnlineKARLHEINZ STOCKHAUSEN, THE controversial German composer, once described the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 as "the greatest work of art ever". Notoriously shocking...

Paradise revised

EssayONE WINTER'S DAY at the end of the '50s, in the Melbourne suburbs of my childhood, I received in the mail an official-looking certificate...

Stay up to date with the latest, news, articles and special offers from Griffith Review.