Sakina Leduc-Akbar
My favorite campus novels have all been set in locations that couldn’t be further from my own academic institution. From the snow-glazed lawns of Hampden College in Donna Tartt’s The Secret History, to the mysterious boarding school of Hailsham in Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go, there was no shortage of campuses with haunting and beautiful scenery. My own university, UC Berkeley, was a far cry from snow-tipped rooftops and the English countryside. I always had a hard time imagining the chaotic ensemble of Sproul Plaza, the repulsive looming shadow of Evans Hall, or the patchy Glade grass could ever amount to the enigmatic campuses I read about. Only recently was I confronted with a rendition of my very own university in David Lodge’s 1975 novel, Changing Places, a book that embraces all of Cal’s quirks, and felt less like a story for escapism than for returning home. As expected, the novel’s depiction of UC Berkeley is neither serene nor mysterious. However, what I didn’t expect was seeing myself reflected in the novel’s portrayal of student writers, a type of campus character that Lodge coins as the most pretentious of all.
However, what I didn’t expect was seeing myself reflected in the novel’s portrayal of student writers, a type of campus character that Lodge coins as the most pretentious of all.
When David Lodge held a position as an Associate Professor at Berkeley, he used his experience as a member of the English faculty to write his novel. Changing Places follows the adventures of two fictional professors of English, the aloof and ambitious Morris Zapp, and the timid, overlooked Philip Swallow. Philip Swallow teaches at Rummidge College in England, a private institution based on the University of Birmingham. Morris Zapp teaches at Euphoric State University, a public university based on The University of California, Berkeley. Through a joint exchange program, the two professors accept the opportunity to switch places in their respective English departments for six months. One perspective follows the adventure of Morris Zapp as he becomes acclimated to life in Rummidge, which he describes as a significant downgrade from Euphoric State. Meanwhile, Philip Swallow’s experience as a Euphoric State transplant is one he regards as an upgrade from his previous position, and he is instantly fascinated by the chaos of the Bay Area university. In contrast to the slow, dispirited population of students back at Rummidge, Euphoric State is essentially Berkeley in the 70s, characterized by politically charged students and hippies who spend all their time participating in demonstrations and protests.
As a Cal student who also grew up in Berkeley, I was able to catch onto all of Lodge’s real-life references, especially the clever name changes, which only students and inhabitants of Berkeley would recognize. “Shattuck Ave” became “Shamrock Ave,” “Sather Gate” became “Mather Gate,” and “Strawberry Creek” became “Blueberry Creek,” among various other name changes that provide every student reader the sensation of being in on something special. I expected much of the book to progress in the same fashion, dotted with little easter eggs from which only I could trace back their real destination. I was delighted to find that Professor Swallow’s office was located in Wheeler Hall (now Dealer Hall), and to discover that the class he is unexpectedly assigned to teach is a creative writing course, English 305: a course in “Extended Narrative,” or novel-writing. The same course still exists today, now titled English 143C “Long Narrative,” and happens to be the same course I took just last semester. I was stunned by the appearance of my class in the novel, for there was no mention of any other creative writing course in Euphoric State. The only other courses that Philip sees listed on the course bulletin are more traditional English courses, covering topics from Augustan Pastoral Poetry to Jane Austen.
Continuing through the story, I was eager to discover how Lodge portrayed the novel-writing course, and found that some aspects of the class are still the same fifty years later. For one, the goal of the class has remained unchanged—under the guidance of a professor, students must launch a novel project to share with the rest of the class. Enrollment is still decided on a selective basis. However, in Lodge’s world, there are exceptions. In one scene, a student named Wily Smith successfully bypasses this application process by bursting into Philip’s office, demanding enrollment in the course, all while explaining the plot of his novel, a so-called brilliant idea which is both problematic and alarming. And yet, Philip relinquishes and says he will think about it, essentially letting him into the class anyway. Although current Berkeley professors might still be bombarded by clever students attempting to bend the rules of the workshop application, the great majority of us creative writing hopefuls take the traditional route and try our luck by submitting a fifteen-page sample of our writing via Google Form.
Was Morris talking about me? Was I, being a future member of this course, predestined to become both lazy and pretentious, if I wasn’t already?
The resemblance to my own class began to dissolve when it came time for commentary from Morris Zapp, the English professor who previously taught at Euphoric State. For one, Morris portrays English 305 as the clown of the course catalog, the one class that no professor seems to take seriously. Morris, who learns Philip is teaching the course, shares his thoughts on what he remembers of the class in an internal monologue that is both wildly exaggerated and ridiculous. Morris tells us that before Philip, a professor named Garth Robinson taught the class. He is nothing short of a disgrace to the English department and is described as being both incompetent and an alcoholic, who wastes his days off in fellowships and pays his students no mind. “English 305 usually fell to some unwilling and unqualified member of the regular teaching staff” (60).
Philip Swallow is no better a replacement. Not only is he unqualified, but he believes that all he needs to teach the course is a book called Let’s Write a Novel by A.J. Beamish, which he left in his office back at Rummidge. The book garners all sorts of blunt, matter-of-fact, and “straight advice.” Confident this is the solution that will bestow him all the qualifications of a creative writing professor, Philip sends his wife, Hilary Swallow, who still resides back home, to fetch it from his office, which Professor Morris now occupies. When Hilary tells Morris the title of the book, he responds with a speculation that maybe the reason Philip needs the book is because he is planning on writing his own novel. Then he adds, “God help the students in English 305.” At this point, the remark comes off as a playful jab at Philip’s incompetence and the ridiculousness of Let’s Write a Novel’s title. However, after telling Philip’s wife that he can’t find the book, she departs, and five minutes later, he stumbles across the book. He reads a passage describing how only a genius should attempt to write a story with an unhappy ending, and novice writers should stick to writing only happy endings. Morris, praising Beamish, then says that such advice is what the students of English 305 need, because they are all “lazy, pretentious bastards . . . who thought they could write the Great American Novel by just typing out their confessions and changing the names” (88). Clearly, Morris doesn’t think highly of Philip, the class, or the students.
I was positively stunned reading this account. Was Morris talking about me? Was I, being a future member of this course, predestined to become both lazy and pretentious, if I wasn’t already? Thinking back to my own class, the workshop was surely a unique experience because there wasn’t any lecturing. Instead, the course relied on the students’ writing samples to shape the day’s agenda. As a result, I constantly worried about the quality of my writing sample, and the only thing which kept me going through long nights of revision, plowing through plot holes and worrying about my syntax, was the knowledge that all fifteen of my classmates and my professor would read and review my pages.
In Changing Places, it doesn’t seem to matter if you’re an excellent writer, or how much time you spend tinkering with your pages, because the class itself is a joke. According to Morris, the prerequisite to being accepted into English 305 isn’t having writerly talent or grit, but delusion—a true belief in the potential of your manuscript that no Professor agrees with. Morris’s perspective hardly stops to consider the gravity of such a statement. Certainly, the exclusivity of the course surely grants its students certain bragging rights. But the novel argues that there is something impossible about the whole construction of the class; that not only is Philip underqualified to teach it, but so are his students, who don’t even belong in it, and whose intense desire to write far outweighs their actual capabilities in crafting a narrative. Morris seems convinced the entire course is doomed at its core.
After having taken the novel-writing course myself, I believe a certain level of delusion is necessary to accomplish anything in the class.
After having taken the novel-writing course myself, I believe a certain level of delusion is necessary to accomplish anything in the class, and that Morris’s commentary is wrought from the lack of belief in student writers. I agree that while the course provides a workshop space where many writers may begin to adopt a certain superiority complex, these fictional professors are forgetting that the purpose of this class is to workshop. A workshop is an unrefined, messy place of progress and fragmented ideas, not a class that expects polished and accomplished manuscripts. The class isn’t a culmination of all the greatest writers dropped in from the sky—predisposed to brilliance—but a class that gives students the space to imagine what they might one day be. Indeed, it is the vigor of the students that seems to upset Morris most. But maybe it isn’t such a bad thing to imagine writing the next Great American novel, because without such far-fetched imagination, would there ever be enough motivation to even launch and continue a project of such magnitude at all? In fact, the course is unique in that the end goal is subjective, and the students are not required to accomplish something concrete, but simply to start something. Really, what Phillip should be telling his students is that they do not need to be exceptionally gifted if they are delusional and persistent, for it was through my own “English 305” class that I learned that consistency beats out talent every time.
After reading such pointed remarks about the class, I was surprised to find that almost all further dissections of this course dissolve as the novel progresses. The course is largely mentioned in passing and treated as the equivalent of a closed-door romance scene, in which the readers are blocked off by what actually goes on in the room (in this case, the classroom). For a class that attracts such pointed remarks, Lodge seems largely unaffected by its creation, figuring the course as less of a three-dimensional plot addition than the target of humorous quips. Perhaps part of the novel class’s fading into the background has to do with the point of view from which the novel is written. Contrary to other campus novels, this story is written strictly from the point of view of professors, and the drama surrounds their faculty, families, and encounters with students. In having such a limited point of view, classes like English 305 naturally fade into the backdrop. Additionally, the only lasting remark we receive from the class is that Philip was unable to get anything out of his students because the novel writing form is an outdated medium to capture one’s experience. He claims that these rambunctious kids are living in a film, not a book, and that is why they always fail to write a book of their own. Philip’s remark might explain why poetry and short fiction hold no space in this fictional Berkeley, and why this novel-writing class is considered such a failure. Lodge is merely using the course to comment on the younger generation’s movement beyond “the novel,” and to argue that those who attempt the feat of writing one—particularly those enrolled in English 305—are a dying species.
The novel constantly remarks on the old-fashioned attitudes of both professors and their inability to comprehend the openness and motivation of the new generation. Perhaps Morris and Philip’s inability to take the plights of new writers seriously in English 305 is a symptom of this fixed mindset, and that is why the portrayal of the novel-writing course remains incomplete. The professors seemed to have forgotten the entire point of courses like English 305 is that the younger generation is given the opportunity to learn from the older one, and in doing so, develop the skills of narrative and story they have yet to acquire. Rather than brushing off the young writers of Euphoric State, Morris and Philip should approach the course with an open mind—first, by putting an end to their gruffling about students’ lack of talent, and make a real effort to encourage the passion of aspiring authors while it still exists. From my own experience, this course, among other creative writing classes, is beloved for the opportunity it provides students to share their chapters with an audience, and remind them that their writing matters. If Philip were able to see into the future—into the version of Berkeley which I am experiencing at this very moment—he would surely revoke his statement, because there never ceases to be a group of student writers who will burst through the professor’s door for a chance at trying their luck at writing the next Great American Novel.
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