Changing Places - David Lodge

Yet another Lodge success. This offers everything you come to expect of him: clever but not self-indulgent tricks, humanity, humour, brilliant plotting and wisdom. Morris Zapp and Phillip Swallow, both academics, one American, one English, swap jobs and the differences between the two worlds on either side of the Atlantic are shown up, both academic and social. The book is especially interesting if you want to be reminded just how much Britain has changed in the last thirty five years because the period detail is magnificent. Morris Zapp could almost by a time traveller when he gawps at British simplicities. Perhaps Lodge's greatest trick ...

David Lodge is one of those authors that are deeply popular and critically acclaimed that much to my shame I had never read. The careful readers amongst you will notice that I used the word had, as I have put this little incident behind me after reading Changing Places, one of Lodge’s earlier works, which for what it is worth won the Hawthornden Prize and the Yorkshire Post fiction prize. Written in 1975, this book tells the story of two lecturers in English Literature, one English and one American, who take part in a teacher exchange scheme. Philip Swallow, journeys to the fictional location of Euphoria on the west coast of America, whilst Morris Zapp ...

This is an expertly written tale of what happens when two very different men exchange roles. On a deeper level it leads to the question, are all of our lives and fates interlinked? However, I'm not a fan of philosophy and I like to read a book for entertainment, and I certainly got that! The main characters: Morris Zapp: qualifiations:phd, publications:many, the authority on Jane Austen, description: tenacious, well respected. Phillip Swallow: qualifications:no phd, publications:not enough, description:sallow, cosy, not promotion material. Somehow these two men swap jobs and end up swapping wives (quite by accident!). The style employed by Lodge is ...