This is the story of Jim Dixon, a hapless lecturer in medieval history at a provincial university who knows better than most that “there was no end to the ways in which nice things are nicer than nasty ones.” Kingsley Amis’s scabrous debut leads the reader through a gallery of emphatically English bores, cranks, frauds, and neurotics with whom Dixon must contend in one way or another in order to hold on to his cushy academic perch and win the girl of his fancy. It was made into a not very good film and, then, amazingly, remade into another not very good film.Regarded by many as the finest, and funniest, comic novel of the twentieth century, Lucky Jim remains as trenchant, withering, and eloquently misanthropic as when it first scandalized readers back in 1954. But, of course, he goes off to win the girl and the better job. Unfortunately, just as he is saying these lines, he collapses, drunk. His downfall is his lecture on Merrie England which, he concludes, is about the most un-Merrie period in our history. He tries, in vain, to fit in with them but he cannot do so. As we see everything from Jim’s point of view, we of course identify with his anti-intellectualism and scorn the academic pretensions of his colleagues and superiors. Indeed, he is really still a student, as sex, booze and wild parties are more in his line. He despises history, classical music, literary soirées and everything else that goes with academia. Jim, like Amis, is proudly anti-intellectual and is clearly in the wrong job (something he successfully rectifies by the end of the novel). Lucky Jim is Jim Dixon, a history lecturer in a provincial university who, frankly, does not fit with the intellectual atmosphere of the history department. Bradbury, though, recognised that its innovation lay not in its form but its spirit, tone and voice.
Malcolm Bradbury, on the other hand, said that it is a remarkably funny book. Of course poor old Muriel does not have much of a sense of humour. The wit and throwaway irony that appears in even the most serious British literature suffers badly from the haw-haw approach to the petty misfortunes and pretensions of the world. Muriel Spark has said that she considers Kingsley Amis the most over-rated author (she’s wrong – it’s Ayn Rand) and said of Lucky Jim that it presented a lowering influence on our way of humourous thinking. Home » England » Kingsley Amis » Lucky Jim Kingsley Amis: Lucky Jim
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