Customer Reviews

Changing Places

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I read this on the train to New Jersey and back in January, and I'm sure my fellow passengers were looking at me strangely, because I was snorting and saying, "ha!" Maybe it's just being around academics again, but I found this novel extremely funny, and I probably will search out more Lodge based on it.

The idea is simple: two professors, one at a small college in England, the other at a huge conglomerate in California, switch places for an academic year. The English professor, who is barely scraping by, longs for the materialism of American society; the American professor, on the verge of divorce, is trying to get his wife to see past his infidelities and acknowledge his worth as a husband. But people are people all over, and while both professors undergo quite a bit of culture shock, and cause some culture shock in the academic societies that they become a part of, the real story here is that it is a small world after all (hmm, funny that, but Small World is the name of the sequel to this novel.

One of the best sections of this novel is the depiction of a game called Humiliation, wherein you must name a novel that you have not read, but that you expect everyone else at the table/party to have read. The idea is that by admitting not having read a canonical text (especially among Literature scholars) you will be humiliated. It's the kind of intellectual party game that Seinfeld watchers just can't join in on, because it assumes a sophistication. Either that, or it's just snobbery.

The other thing that raises this story about similar counterparts (including Kingsley Amis' Lucky Jim, which I liked, but not as much as this novel) is the clever way in which it shifts form within the story. For example, section three is done entirely epistolary, while the ending is written in screenplay format. The novel is also self-reflecting, in a wry sort of metafictional way. You know that you're reading a story, and the story knows that you are reading it, but instead of pressing the point as in some of the more aggressive post-modern works, it does some sly winks and nods in the general direction of the reader.

As a British graduate student at UC Berkeley, the campus upon which "Euphoric State" is closely modelled, and as a graduate of an English university similar to "Rummidge," which doubles for Birmingham, I can vouch for the accuracy of Lodge's beautifully-wrought satire. I zipped through "Changing Places" in less than a day and can't remember the last time I enjoyed a novel so much. Lodge was a visiting professor from Birmingham who taught at Berkeley in the late 60s (Philip Swallow is thus a kind of alter ego), and thirty-two years after the action takes place, there's much that's still recognizable here. The satire of academic life in England and America hits the bullseye, the characterizations are broad but retain a sympathetic humanity, the drama is compelling and amusingly risqué. There's also a nicely constructed vein of self-referential literariness that emerges on occasion, without being obtrusive. Accusations by some readers that the novel is "dated" miss the point - one might as well say Jane Austen is dated. Yes, the era of campus radicalism and sit-ins has receded into history, but the comparisons Lodge draws between English and U.S. campus life, academic politics and professors are still mostly valid. (Perhaps the biggest difference is that British academics have since come closer to their U.S. counterparts in having to worry about "publish or perish.") It's fascinating to note that many of the minutiae have not changed: British lecturers still give grades like Swallow's ultra-precise B+/B+?+; Berkeley's Telegraph Avenue ("Cable Avenue" in the book) is still a living monument to hippiedom (albeit somewhat commercialized now) and its People's Park ("People's Garden") survives unfenced and enjoyed by the community. Two caveats: readers addicted to neat-and-tidy Hollywood endings may be disappointed; everyone else should take care to read "Changing Places" first, proceed to "Small World," and then go on to "Nice Work."

David Lodge's "Changing Places" had me in stitches. It's such a funny book. The prose is highly readable, crisply written and races along so charmingly that it's hard to put it down once you've started. Although Philip Swallow and Morris Zapp are drawn from the two contrasting cultures they symbolise, they are never allowed to degenerate into caricatures. Both are highly real and believable characters, sharing much the same human frailties. While Zapp is unashamedly direct, hollow and crass, Swallow is rather more reserved, diffident, but with the same potential though not the guts for dishonesty. It is only by "changing places" that they become themselves, albeit in a different environment. Even the behaviour of their wives change when subjected to the opposite cultural influences. Admittedly, the setting of the "exchange" in the late 60s (with all the references to student protests and pot smoking in university campuses) has tended to date the book a bit. But who cares, when you derive such enormous pleasure, laughter and fun from reading what must seem like a novel for the ages. I can see thousands reading it 50 years into the new millenium.

It is obvious that Lodge is looking at the tumultuous student movements and blossoming women's movements of the late 60's from a critical distance. Both are satirized in this novel; but it is primarily concerned with exposing the inherent differences between British and American Academia and poking fun at the upper echelons of the ivory tower of English literature. The student movements serve merely as a backdrop for the mid-life crises of Lodge's main characters.

This is the story of Morris Zapp, an American professor of English literature and Jane Austen expert, and Philip Swallow, his English counterpart. They undertake an academic exchange between their respective universities, and swap more than just their positions, as their personal lives become intertwined in a typical Lodgian move: all things are connected.

This is an intelligent book, full of interesting if not improbable plot twists. The dialogue is witty, the prose full of brilliant and well-used ten cent words to build a vocabulary on. It is not laugh out loud funny, but snicker out the side of your mouth humor. The experimental part at the end is a bit misshapen and very disappointing, especially for the reader, who comes to care about his characters.

And yet this is about something much bigger, especially for the academic. These are men who are trying to make their way in a world where publish or perish is the only mantra. Their respective crises are coupled with new couplings on both sides of the Atlantic, and a new view on life--all they needed was a change of place. They seem to have discovered how much there is to gain by leaving that which you know. I'm not sure how much truth there is to that belief, this is most unfortunate for the marriages in discussion, but in the end, aren't the women also better off? We can't know. He leaves us hanging.

This is a great novel for the literary academic in all of us, for those who wonder what kind of actual resonance their life's work has, for those who have discovered that new, brief experiences can turn your life on its head.

It's now nine years since I read Changing Places, and even today I start glowing whenever I see a copy. Personally, I very much prefer Morris Zapp and Euphoric State University to Philipp Swallow or Rummage, but both sides of this hilarious transatlantic parallel are just so funny and heartwarming. Needless to say, I've read every Lodge book since, and Changing Places is clearly the turning point to the great writer he has become.

I have read this book after its successor "Small World" which I enjoyed very much. And even if it is quite entertaining it does not reach up to the later novel - not at all. It was nice to observe the two protagonists Swallow and Zapp trying to adapt to the way of life at an American respectively British university in the 60s. In describing and satirizing the academic world Lodge is at his best. But having him experimenting with the novel (newspaper clippings make up the center part of the book, a film-script the end) did not seem very convincing in this context. Where the story should really take off it becomes downright boring through this technique. Pale in comparison to "Small World" and "Nice Work", the third book in the series.

_Changing Places_ is David Lodge's 1975 novel about two professors, one from a fictional university in America, and one from a fictional university in England, who each take each the other's position for half a year. The English professor is Philip Swallow, from the University of Rummidge. (A red brick university, presumably based to some extent on the University of Birmingham, where Lodge was a professor for a long time.) The American is Morris Zapp, from the State University of Euphoria. This is rather transparently Cal Berkeley: it's on the "Esseph Bay", which features a famous bridge called the "Silver Span", and more importantly, it's 1969 and the students are restless.

Philip is a somewhat ineffectual man, married with 3 children, but rather tired of his marriage, who has never specialized and never really finished much in the way of publications. He is stuck in his position, unwilling to put the energy into either his career or to political maneuvering which would get him promotions. Morris is much more aggressive. He is a leading Jane Austen scholar, twice married with one child by his first wife and twins by his second wife. His second wife has told him she wants a divorce, and his trip to England is in part a cooling off device.

Lodge has a good deal of fun, some of it routine, some quite clever, with the culture clash of the brash American at the provincial British university and the shy Briton at the high profile American university. But he is more deeply interested in the mid-life crises of the two men. These are resolved (to some extent) with some perhaps predictable but still very neatly done plot manipulations, as the two men manage to bump into each others' wives, and also manage to involve themselves fairly successfully (in some sense) in the politics of the two universities. Lodge also has a good deal of fun with narrative form: telling part of the story in epistolary form, and some more of it with news stories and personal ads extracted from the papers. His conclusion is also a bit experimental, and pretty sensible. It's a very funny book, very enjoyable -- Lodge is rapidly establishing himself as a favorite of mine.

David Lodge experiments with many literary styles in this book, progressing from narration to letter collections, finishing with a dramatic script at the end. The Britsh professor's conversion from stifled to swinging is sexy, and the American's discovery of deeper purposes than power and promiscuity is rewarding. Such an entertaining piece which can equally stimulate the intellect is rare. David Lodge is a truly talented writer- a must read!

Changing Places is a hilarious send up of academia. Although set in the later 1960's and somewhat dated, the humor relating to the ineffable foibles of the academic class in both Britain and America is timeless.

The story surrounds the yearly professorial exchange between two schools, Rummidge University in England and Ephoric State in America (a thinly disguised Berkely). The circumstances of the exchange provide for two very different characters making the move for entirely different-yet similar-reasons. They find themselves in circumstances beyond their ken in both cases and this leads to a certain amount of situational comedy, funny enough in its way but second rate compared to the forthright academic skewering that Lodge puts forth throughout this novel.

There is lot of implied sex in the novel, nothing graphic but the reader is forewarned. Most of it is between the wives of the absent professors and the new arrival, but the general "free love" of the 60's is depicted as well.

On the whole one of the best academic comedies I have read in a long time. Not quite up to Russo's standards, but very well done nevertheless. Even better, this is but the 1st book of a trilogy involving the same set of characters. The second installment is next in line on my reading list and it's a testament to "Changing Places" that I can hardly wait to get to it.

Very enjoyable light reading for any occasion.

This book is not without its failings but like Boyle's "The Tortilla Curtain" I gave it five stars for its excellent entertainment value coupled with wonderful writing.
Published in 1975 and set in 1969 this book bubbles with picturesque observations and a penetratingly accurate portrayal of the differences between English Academia versus American Academia. Policeman Plod versus Sherriff Shlick.
The book revolves around the exchange posting between two lecturers, one an American from California, Morris Zapp, and the other from the Midlands England, Philip Sparrow. David Lodge weaves a wonderful tapestry around the six months each lecturer spends in the other's campus. Albeit at times slightly over political with regard to the student unrest in the late 60's which is less of interest to today's reader, this novel is an excellent depiction of its period.
Lodge's sharp wit comes to life very early and I especially enjoyed Zapp's surprise on learning that he was the only man of the 156 passengers aboard the charter flight to Heathrow. If you cannot guess why, read this wonderful novel and find out.