Why a Booktrail?
1950s: A witty campus novel that skewers the hypocrisies and vanities of 1950s academic life.
Lucky Jim
What you need to know before your trail
Jim Dixon has accidentally fallen into a job at one of Britain’s new red brick universities. A moderately successful future in the History Department beckons – as long as Jim can stave off the unwelcome advances of fellow lecturer Margaret, survive a madrigal-singing weekend at Professor Welch’s, deliver a lecture on ‘Merrie England’ and resist Christine, the hopelessly desirable girlfriend of Welch’s awful son Bertrand. Inspired by Amis’s friend, the poet Philip Larkin, Jim Dixon is a timeless comic character, adrift in a hopelessly gauche and pretentious world, in a witty campus novel that skewers the hypocrisies and vanities of 1950s academic life.
Travel Guide
The academic England of Kingsley Amis
The novel follows the exploits of James (Jim) Dixon, a reluctant lecturer at an unnamed provincial English university.
Apparently, Amis got Dixon’s surname from 12 Dixon Drive, Leicester, the address of Philip Larkin from 1948 to 1950, while he was a librarian at the university there. The book is dedicated to him, who helped to inspire the main character and contributed to the structure of the novel.
The map shows some of the filming locations for the movie.
BookTrail Boarding Pass: Lucky Jim
Destination/Location: England Author: Kingsley Amis Departure: 1950s
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