VISITING MRS. NABOKOV by Martin Amis...

VISITING MRS. NABOKOV by Martin Amis (Vintage: $12; 274 pp.). In this anthology of vivid personal essays, Martin Amis demonstrates what critical journalism can be, but all too seldom is. In an account of the 1992 Republican Convention in 1992, he describes Pat Robertson as “a charlatan of Chaucerian dimensions”; on the set of “RoboCop II,” he notes the title character “looks like a wasp-waisted three-ton Swiss Army penknife with all its blades outturned.” In his more literary pieces, Amis lunches with Graham Greene and visits the widow of the reclusive creator “Pale Fire” and “Ada.” But in a telling recollection of his efforts to interview Madonna, he notes: “Not greatly gifted, not deeply beautiful, Madonna tells America that fame comes from wanting it badly enough. And everyone is terribly good at badly wanting things.”