“Experience” by Martin Amis (post 7): Memoir includes letters written by his “persona” named “Osric,” who he is said to have felt was not at all like him

Memoir’s Index

“Osric:

—as MA [Martin Amis] persona, 15, 17, 34, 110, 119, 131, 153, 167n, 173n, 191n, 231n, 239, 240n

—letters from, 9-11, 19-21, 37-38, 55-57, 74-75, 86-88, 107-9, 126-27, 150-51, 173-74, 193-94, 212-13, 231-33, 250-51, 270-72” (1, p. 398).

As you can see from the memoir's index, Amis documents his “persona” at great length.

But he does not explain it.

The clearest comment I can find is the following:

Persona Disavowed

“In Martin Amis’s memoir, Experience, he includes verbatim reproductions of letters he sent as a teenager and young man, primarily to his father, to add depth to his own character and to provide an interesting dual-track narrative, which runs parallel to the more conventional course of the book. He confesses fairly early on in his contemporary account that the letters were written by a person he does not recognise, someone who is not even perceptibly him – though this could of course be the product of reflexive embarrassment at observing his youthful precocity after all of the years which had passed…

“He terms this personality ‘Osric’, after the simpering, jejune courtier in Hamlet…” (2).

1. Martin Amis. Experience. New York, talk miramax/Hyperion, 2000.

2. James Snell. “The Experience of Martin Amis.”
https://jamespetersnell.wordpress.com/2016/05/22/the-experience-of-martin-amis/