David Lodge

[KEV67]

I was sad to hear he had died, although he must have been getting old. I have read a number of his books, including Paradise News, Nice Work, Ginger You're Barmy, Changing Places, Small World, A Man of Parts, Author Author, and one or two others. He was a professor in English as well as an author himself. I read in this month's The Critic that he ran a year long teaching class just on Ulysses by James Joyce. It would take that long to understand it. It seems he taught all that French deconstructionist stuff that doesn't make much sense to me.

[France]

I went off David Lodge entirely (though he was an excellent author)after one of his articles in a series he wrote for the Independent in the early 90s on the art of Fiction in which he said that a Mills and Boon author had plagariazed one of his books, turning a serious story into a romance. Her career was wrecked.  Mills and Boon cancelled her contract (4 more books) and she sued on the basis that a) she had never read David Lodge's book and b)her story was based on Mrs Gaskall's North and South. He was forced to admit in court that his book was based on North and South too and had to pay substantial damages, but the M&B author's career was shot. Mud sticks.

 

I remember the original article and even while I still thought it was based on fact I was struck by the unpleasant superiority of his tone, how dare a lowly romance author use a similar plot line to a proper intellectual like himself. 

 

I haven't been able to stomach him since.