This session takes as its starting point the evolution of the campus novel as a reflection of changing university life in Britain from the post-war era immediately after the Education Act of 1944 through the parallel growth of “redbrick” institutions and the founding of entirely “new” universities in the 1960s to the Further and Higher Education Act of 1992 which abolished the “binary divide” between polytechnics and universities and greatly expanded the sector and on to Tony’s Blair’s 2001 target of sending at least 50% of young people into a mass higher education system by the end of the decade. We shall focus on two key themes from this period of dramatic change as highlighted by the parallel development of the British campus novel: first, how the shifting depiction of administrative and managerial staff allows us to trace the extraordinary transformation that has overtaken British universities since the 1950s; and second, how the portrayal of sex, women and gender in an academic environment has been affected by what has also been a period of wider social upheaval in Britain in which the universities have played their full part. Our attendees will be encouraged to reflect on their own professional experiences as administrators in the context of these two sets of issues which have clearly been central to the development of the contemporary university, and to explore them through a combination of group conversation and plenary debate. Our session will be accessible not only to the many existing fans of the genre who are employed within universities but also to those who may be new to this form of contemporary literature and who are interested in what it might say about the places where we work. It will make particular use of examples drawn from a broad range of well-known campus novels including Kingsley Amis’s Lucky Jim (1954), Malcolm Bradbury’s The History Man (1975), Tom Sharpe’s Porterhouse Blue (1974), David Lodge’s Changing Places (1975), Small World (1984) and Nice Work (1988).

1. AUA Conference 2017, Working Session 411
The University Transformed?:
University Life & the Campus Novel
Katie Allan and Martin Dowling

2. Outline of our session:
• The Novels: what’s it all about?
 Kingsley Amis, Lucky Jim, (1953)
 Tom Sharpe, Porterhouse Blue (1974)
 Malcolm Bradbury, The History Man (1975)
 Tom Sharpe, Wilt (1976)
 David Lodge, Changing Places (1975)
 David Lodge, Small World (1984)
 David Lodge, Nice Work (1988)
• Transforming Places/Transforming Times: campus novels and their eras …and
today?
• Portrayals of …
 the Female Academic the Male Academic
 the Academic Wife
 the Departmental Secretary
 the Student
• Discussion: what would we put into a 2017 campus novel?
• Conclusions: What have we learned? What might the future hold?

3. The Novels: what’s it all about?
A walk through the novels
Kingsley Amis,
Lucky Jim, (1954)

4. Tom Sharpe,
Porterhouse Blue (1974)
The Novels: what’s it all about?
A walk through the novels

5. The Novels: what’s it all about?
A walk through the novels
Malcolm Bradbury,
The History Man (1975)

6. The Novels: what’s it all about?
A walk through the novels
Tom Sharpe, Wilt (1976)

7. David Lodge,
Changing Places (1975)
The Novels: what’s it all about?
A walk through the novels

8. David Lodge,
Small World (1984)
The Novels: what’s it all about?
A walk through the novels

9. David Lodge,
Nice Work (1988)
The Novels: what’s it all about?
A walk through the novels

10. 1950s rock ‘n’ roll;
post-war era;
red brick universities; social
conformity.

11. 1960s: pop culture;
sexual freedom;
new universities; radical
thinking.

12. 1970s: women’s liberation;
industrial unrest; economic
uncertainty; cheap(er) air
travel

13. 1980s: feminisism; Thatcherism;
grants; HE cuts; strikes; uncertainty;
technological advances

14. Portrayal of the Female Academic
‘Part of what makes Lucky Jim seem contemporary is
the presence of women on the faculty. On the other
hand, they are pretty dreadful’
Elaine Showalter, Faculty Towers: the Academic Novel & its Discontents ( 2005): p30

15. Portrayal of the Female Academic
•Hysterical/manipulative/emotionally fragile
•Partner/muse/co-dependency
•Free-thinking/ independent/strong
•Socially aware
•No strong characterisation
(except for Robyn Penrose)
• Change of portrayal over time?

16. Type A(lpha):
•intellectually dominant
•charismatic leader
•sexually confident
•assertive
Portrayal of the Male Academic

17. Type B(ashful):
‘He is a mimetic man:
unconfident, eager to please,
infinitely suggestible.’
David Lodge, Changing Places (1975): p7
Portrayal of the Male Academic
(typically stronger characterisations than of the female academic)
Timid, absent-minded, accident-
prone, nice, dull, ineffectual,
insecure, geeky, pulled between
duty and desire, naïve.
•Change of portrayal over time?

18. “Zapp was distinguished and Swallow was not. Zapp was the
man who had published articles in PMLA while still in graduate
school; who, enviably offered his first job by Euphoric State , had
stuck out for twice the going salary, and got it; who had
published five fiendishly clever books by the time he was thirty
and achieved the rank of full professor at the same precocious
age. Swallow was a man scarcely known outside his own
department, who had published nothing except a handful of
essays and reviews, who had risen slowly up the salary scale of
Lecturer by standard increments and was now halted at the top
with slender prospects of promotion. Not that Philip Swallow
was lacking in intelligence or ability; but he lacked will and
ambition, the professional killer instinct which Zapp abundantly
possessed.” David Lodge, Changing Places (1975): p15

19. ‘she is at this minute just a person, as she
puts it, trapped in the role of wife and
mother, in the limited role of woman in our
society’ Malcolm Bradbury, The History
Man (1975): p3
• Frustration/disappointment
• Domestic sphere/lack of employment
• Hobbies/community engagement
• Impact of Women’s Lib
Portrayal of the Academic Wife

20. Portrayal of the Academic Wife
“Women’s Liberation? What’s that?’ says
Morris Zapp, not liking the sound of it at all.
‘I never heard of it.’ (Few people have on
this first day of 1969). “You will, Professor,
you will,’ says the girl’ David Lodge,
Changing Places (1975): p34
‘Boy, have they got your number!’ David
Lodge, Changing Places (1975): p151

21. Portrayal of the Academic Wife
‘Women’s Lib meant more than burning your
bra. It meant total commitment to the
programme of women’s superiority over men.’
Tom Sharpe, Wilt (1976): p20
What happened to
the academic wife?
Extinct?

22. ‘two nice, neat secretaries,
Miss Pink from Streatham,
Miss Minnehaha Ho, from
Taiwan; they sit in their
miniskirts, opposite each
other, in front of typewriters,
their knees just touching.’
Malcolm Bradbury, The
History Man (1975): p61
Portrayal of the Departmental Secretary

23. Portrayal of the Departmental Secretary
•subservient
•dizzy/young
•under-employed
•portrayals often:
cynical/sexist/patronising
•future:
professionalisation
specialisation
career pathways

24. A Watermouth Tutorial Experience …
‘Watermouth makes students nervous; you never
know quite what to expect. There are classes where
you have, on arrival, to eat something, or touch each
other, or recount last night’s dreams, or undress, in
order to induce that strange secular community that
is, in Watermouth terms, the essence of a good class,
a class that is interesting.’
Malcolm Bradbury, The History Man (1975): p128
Portrayal of the Student

25. … And its Impact on Undergraduates
‘They have changed together, passing through those
utter transformations of personality which at
Watermouth are an ongoing spiritual necessity: … A
neat, respectful public schoolboy has become
irritable, proletarian Michael Bennard; a frail, bright
teenager has become dark-eyed Felicity Phee.’
Malcolm Bradbury, The History Man (1975): p131
Portrayal of the Student

26. Portrayal of the Student from the 50s to 80s
small student numbers; elite minority; state funded;
partying/drinking student culture in popular
consciousness; radicalism; women’s liberation;
individualism; sexual/personal/intellectual
freedom; availability of graduate professions/jobs

27. Portrayal of the Student from the 90s to today
mass expansion; diverse student population;
growth in overseas students; increasing costs
through tuition fees; students as consumers and
increase focus on their studies; employability;
skills; future ambitions; student voice (NSS/TEF)

28. Return to Student Idealism?

29. Transforming Universities
… a glimpse of the future?

30. Discussion
What would you put in a 2017 campus novel?
characters?
settings?
themes?
10 minutes

31. Conclusions
• What have we learned through the campus
novel about university life?
• What might the future hold both for the
campus novel and UK university life?
• Final thoughts?

32. Katie Allan (ka22@st-andrews.ac.uk)
Martin Dowling (mjd11@st-andrews.ac.uk )