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David Lodge - Changing Places

Two main Characters: Personality, Family, Career

Morris Zapp

  • 40 years old
  • smoker
  • he never left america so far
  • never been to England
  • on his flight, he was the only man on board
  • long gorilla-like arms
  • professor of English Literature
  • cannot swim
  • light-headed
  • veteran of long distance flying
  • he exaggerates
  • he's got his second wife, Desirée; she wants the divorce
  • two children: Elizabeth and Darcy
  • distinguished
  • published articles in PMLA (journal of the Modern Language Association of America)
  • published 5 books
  • achieved rank of full prof at the age of 30
  • wife wants him to move away for half a year → Morris takes the exchange job
  • is prone to indigestion after rich restaurant meals
  • usually needs a sleeping-pill before retiring
  • develops a pot-belly
  • has neither affection nor respect for the British (thinks they act like fags = gays)
 ("bottomless morass of English manners" p.47) 
  • apartment on the top floor of a huge old house owned by an Irish doctor called O'Shea


Philipp Swallow

  • afraid of flying
  • 40 years old
  • unaccustomed to traveling
  • unconfident
  • infinitely suggestible
  • observes other people
  • conservative/traditional
  • married
  • good imagination
  • professor of English Literature
  • excited about flying/travelling
  • he met Charles Boon, an old student of him, on his flight and he is going to Euphoria State School, too
  • not distinguished
  • he liked examinations and did well in them
  • Finals had been the supreme moment of his life
  • truely loved literature
  • applied for a Fellowship to America
  • applied for an Assistant Lectureship at the University of Rummidge
  • went to Harvard but he didn't really like it
  • got to know Hilary Broome (postgraduate student)
  • asked her to marry him
  • they were married by an Episcopalian minister in Boston
  • unsuspected, long repressed appetite for sensual pleasure
  • relaxed, confident, happy
  • learned to drive Hilary's Chevrolet Impala
  • sailed back to England (Hilary pregnant)
  • three years later: second child came and third was on the way
  • large, damp and draughty Victorian villa
  • sexual life is neglected
  • is glad that he can escape from his normal life (no responsibility for family every day)
  • rents an apartment high up on Pythagoras Drive (which slides down the hill after every earthquake)
  • Melany Byrd lives with two other girls in the apartment under Phil



University Life and Academical System

Euphoric State University

  • a long existing scheme for the exchange of visiting teachers
  • in California
  • lavish provision of laboratories, libraries
  • not too diffucult to obtain a bachelor's degree
  • students are left very much to their own devices
  • necessary credits are accumulated at free time
  • cheating at school is easy
  • pressure at schhol begins at postgraduate level
  • students have time for sports, alcohol, entertainment, opposite sex
  • campus with itsw hite buildings, bosky paths, its campanile and plaza, its lecture rooms, stadia and laboratories


Rummidge

  • a long existing scheme for the exchange of visiting teachers
  • in the English Midlands
  • pressure is much bigger than in the US
  • student is lonely, forlorn, uncertain

Life in the USA vs. Life in Britain

USA

  • sunny weather
  • cold beer
  • heated open-air swimming pools
  • multi-flavoured ice-cream
  • violent and melodramatic land
  • divisions of race and ideology
  • traumatized by political assassinations
  • campuses in revolt
  • cities seizing up
  • countryside poisoned and devastated
  • Phil has a nice ambience around his flat and a nice view (nature, sea; p.56)

Britain

  • rain
  • Morris' view is not as beautiful (dank back gardens, ill-looking trees, grimy roofs, factory chimneys; p.57)






About Me

  • Name: Sarah
  • age: 18
  • City: Haßfurt
  • LK's: English & French

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