The British Museum is Falling Down (Penguin Decades)

by David Lodge (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2010

  $4.51

  Penguin Decades bring you the novels that helped shape modern Britain. When they were published, some were bestsellers, some were considered scandalous, and others were simply misunderstood. All represent their time and helped define their generation, while today each is considered a landmark work of storytelling. David Lodge's The British Museum is Falling Down was published in 1965 and is a brilliant comic satire of academia, religion and human entanglements. It tells the story of hapless, scooter-riding young research student Adam Appleby, who is trying to write his thesis but is constantly distracted - not least by the fact that, as Catholics in the 1960s, he and his wife must rely on 'Vatican roulette' to avoid a fourth child.

• Used

  Paperback
  1983

  $3.12

  The Rhythm Method is the curse of young Adam Appleby's life and the cause of his children's. While Adam gestates his thesis in the British Museum, his wife worries at home because her period is late and a fourth little bundle of (expensive) joy seems to be on the way, thanks to 'Vatican Roulette'. Though Adam's experience is constantly coloured by the authors he is studying, one distinction remains clear: 'Literature is mostly about having sex, and not much about having children. Life is the other way round.' A sharply perceptive comic novel, London Bridge is Falling Down brilliantly captures the absurd, pitiful dilemma of Catholics in the days when the Pill was just an enticing rumour.