Martin Amis, the British author of 15 novels including “Money: A Suicide Note” and “The Zone of Interest,” has died on May 19 of esophageal cancer at the age of 73, according to his publishing house Alfred A. Knopf.
His death comes just days after Jonathan Glazer’s film adaptation of his 2014 novel “The Zone of Interest” premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. Amis’ satirical novel follows a Nazi officer who falls in love with the wife of his camp commandant at Auschwitz, with the love triangle playing out as the trio reacts to the genocide happening around them with varying levels of apathy.
Amis is best known for his “London Trilogy,” three novels released between 1985 and 1995 that sharply satirized late-stage capitalism and its impact on London society.
The first of those novels was “Money: A Suicide Note,” which follows a commercial director as he struggles to make his first feature film. Amis made a name for himself as a writer with a darkly comedic style and based the plot of “Money” off of his experiences as a screenwriter on a film called “Saturn 3,” which starred Kirk Douglas and was widely panned.
Amis’ other literary works include his 2000 memoir “Experience,” his 2003 Booker Prize shortlisted novel “Time’s Arrow” and his final publication “Inside Story in 2020.
“He used to say that what he wanted to do was leave behind a shelf of books – to be able to say, “from here to here, it’s me,’” author Salman Rushdie told The New Yorker. “His voice is silent now. His friends will miss him terribly. But we have the shelf.”
Amis is survived by his wife, Isabel, and five children.
