Another One Down

Faulty Towers Meets the Academy—that’s my TV Guide description of Lucky Jim, the latest on my PhD reading list.

The story follows an inept British university lecturer bumbling through a series of social and academic disasters. His bumblings are not due to a lack of intelligence, mind you, but rather to complete disregard for academia’s absurdities such as the publish-or-perish mentality and cut-throat colleagues.

Some describe the book as hilarious, which I suppose was true forty-some years ago when it hit the shelves. But today that assessment seems overrated. Still, I did laugh out loud twice. Though it took me a full fifty pages to “get into” the 150-page book, the moments of whimsy made for a “not completely unfortunate” read.