Author Description
"A great fund of comic invention." - "Times Literary Supplement" "Written with great spirit... very funny... fresh, unhackneyed and excellently observed." - "Listener" "[A] bustling kaleidoscope of a book, by an author fertile in expedient, keenly observant and occasionally probing the heart of darkness." - "Sunday Times" Charles Lumley feels that he has been born in captivity - the captivity of his smugly conventional bourgeois upbringing. Now he has just graduated from university, only to make the discouraging discovery that his education has rendered him unfit for any kind of useful employment. Wondering what to do with the rest of his life and longing to escape, a chance remark overheard in a pub sets him off on a picaresque and hilarious tour of 1950s Britain. He undergoes a string of comic misadventures as he works as a window cleaner, a drug trafficker, a hospital orderly, and a chauffeur, all while trying to find his place in the world and win the love of the beautiful Veronica Roderick. John Wain (1925-1994) was one of the great English men of letters of the 20th century, a prolific novelist, poet, biographer, and critic whose many accolades included the Somerset Maugham Award, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and the Whitbread Award. "Hurry on Down" (1953), his first novel, ushered in a new kind of English novel and paved the way for many later classics, including Kingsley Amis's "Lucky Jim" (1954) and John Braine's "Room at the Top" (1957). This 60th anniversary edition includes an introduction by Nick Bentley and marks the novel's first republication in the United States in more than half a century.
Menrva's Summary
THE PULSE
Charles Lumley rejects his stifling bourgeois upbringing to embark on a chaotic, picaresque search for personal authenticity across 1950s Britain. After graduating from university, Lumley finds himself alienated from conventional society and unable to secure traditional employment. He drifts through a series of disparate social strata, working as a window cleaner, drug runner, and hospital orderly. The narrative follows his erratic trajectory as he attempts to navigate the rigid class structures of post-war England while pursuing a romantic interest.
INSIDE THE PAGES
- Episodic narrative structure typical of the picaresque tradition
- Sharp social satire targeting the British class system
- Rapid shifts in tone between comedy and existential inquiry
- Diverse array of working-class and eccentric characters
- First-person perspective capturing the protagonist's disillusionment
- Vivid depictions of mid-century British urban and rural environments
- Focus on the absurdity of social expectations and professional norms
- Exploration of the conflict between individual desire and societal conformity
THE COLLECTIVE ECHO
Readers and critics frequently identify this work as a foundational text of the Angry Young Men movement in British literature. Discussion often centers on the novel's frenetic pacing and its ability to balance slapstick humor with a genuine critique of post-war social stagnation. Many observers highlight the protagonist's aimless drift as a poignant representation of the intellectual alienation felt by the generation following the Second World War. The prose is consistently noted for its observational precision and its role in shifting the trajectory of the mid-century English novel. Readers interested in the evolution of 20th-century social satire often find this book to be a significant historical marker.
Page Count:
256
Publication Date:
1960-01-05
Publisher:
Penguin UK
ISBN-10:
014001442X
ISBN-13:
9780140014426
Fiction
Satire
Contemporary
1950s
Coming of Age
Picaresque
British literature
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