Death of David Lodge, great figure in British literature

The British writer, famous in particular for his “Campus Trilogy”, died on January 1, announced his publishing house. He was 89 years old.

IHe was one of the French's favorite British authors. The writer David Lodge, known in particular for his “Campus Trilogy” in which he ironically depicts the university environment, died on 1^is January at the age of 89, his publishing house announced Friday.

“His contribution to literary culture has been immense, both through his criticism and through his masterful and emblematic novels which have already become classics”wrote its editor Liz Foley in a press release. “We are very proud of his achievements and the pleasure that his works of fiction, in particular, have brought to so many people”added his children in the press release from the Penguin Random House publishing house.

David Lodge was born a few years before the war, on January 28, 1935, a moment “fairly favorable” to be born for a future writer in England, he said, in a style typical of his deadpan humor. He grew up in a modest environment, in the south suburbs of London, where university was a “uncharted territory”. The writer is a pure product of the meritocracy of England in the 1950s. Pushed by his college teachers, this talented student entered University College London to study literature.

In 1960, he began teaching English literature at the University of Birmingham, where he spent his entire career. The same year, he published his first novel The Picturegoersfollowed in 1962 by Ginger, you’re barmy. It is with his “Campus Trilogy” – Change of scenery (1975), A very small world (1984) et Board game (1988) – that he demonstrated the extent of his talent.

Drawing inspiration from his own experience as a professor, and in particular from a long study trip to the United States, he describes with biting irony the university environment through two representatives of this “minority with exacerbated puritanism”the Englishman Phillip Swallow and the American Morris Zapp.

The first volume earned him the prestigious Hawthorndern Prize, which recognized him as an author, courted by television, which adapted some of his works. In his bestseller Therapy (1995), he sketches the world of media elites, particularly television.

The final part of his autobiography, Succeed, more or lesswas published in France in 2023.