The Humour Club discussion
Group Reads
>
January Group Read - Lucky Jim
date
newest »
newest »
Mod
fair enough, I doubt theres any real difference between them, but I checked if my library had it this morning, and they had an older edition, and they've ordered in a new one, so it made me wonder if there was a difference...I'll be reading whichever one I can get first :P
My library has a copy as well - thank goodness! But, it has two versions as well, one being a 'UK Version'. Bugger, what do I do?Oh, did someone mention garfield...I love reading garfield, except on Mondays...I hate Mondays :)
We just watched Garfield's Christmas the other day, and I have to say it is funny...and has some great music ♪gimme gimme gimmeeee♪
Alright, I have Lucky Jim in my hands as we 'speak'. Are there any penalties, ie 2 mins in the box, if I start commenting early?You could consider it an early Xmas present from me?
Mod
Speaking of which, I'm slightly embarrassed to be a Canadian today...which has led me to write a letter to our Prime Minister."Dear PM,
I just want to write you a quick note congratulation you on doing such a good job showing the world how out of touch you are with the real values of Canadians. Pulling out of the Kyoto Accord...."
I really did write and send this. I'll let you know what the response is.
So, I open the book and on the back page of the cover is the price £1.50...that is funny. Both b/c it's in pounds (not Canadian $) and it's only 1.50!There is also a date stamp, from when my library got the book, 1974! Isn't that funny!
Oh, I have big expectations for the rest of the book.
Mod
Melki wrote: "Wow! Can't believe you've started already. I'm still trying to catch up on my December group reads."Again, I don't have a problem starting things. My problem is finis...
First Question (directed at all those living in the UK). There is a few references to one of the characters having a 'northern accent'. I'm having trouble actually figuring out what this means.I feel it is a good thing, that it sounds non-confrontational, even friendly? Is this an upper class accent or something?
Bugger, I feel I'm losing a lot out of this book b/c I don't know english accents!
Mod
I have heard the term "Geordie" for the same thing, and I had the feeling it was a slur.
I'm at the 100 page mark - this is the make or break point in a book for me. Let's just say if this were any other group I'd toss the book in the trash...then fish it out, wipe off the bigmac sauce and toenails, and return it to the library.But, since I vowed I'd finish this...I need to rant.
It's just not that funny! The story is stale and doesn't seem to go anywhere!! There is potential, with the quirky professor and Dixon's loathing of life, but it never materializes into anything?
I like extremes in my comedy writing I suppose, ie It's Thursday and the world ended. Or, It's 8:45 and 10 seconds, 11 seconds, 11 and a half seconds and the world ended! Pick one extreme or the other; that's funny.
Anyone else need a rant post?
the geordie accent:http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=g...#
northern accents have longer vowel sounds than southern ones, so tend to be softer.
The yorkshire accent, after a small time of the irrascible Mr Fry speaking:
http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=y...#
the Barnsley dialect is the oldest dialect in Britain.
Accents change within a few miles, I live in York, where people pronounce the word sure as "shewer", I was raised to say it as "shur", and people in Haxby, 5 miles down the road, say "shore". British accents are a many varied and beautiful thing.
The geordie accent is generaly considered one fo the best for use in call centres etc, because of its calming influence... thogh a geordie in a rage is a scary thing. I lived in Newcastle for 7 years, I love the geordie accent, but still manage to get it wrong, and suggest a mackham has a geordie accent, and then you're in trouble...
Mod
tell me Melki, any problems understanding the geordie poem? It wasn't too broad, so I can't forsee too many problems. Unlike if he'd said something like "away makka, yeh gen yem"
Nice work Hazel. Northern accents also get stereotyped as working class. Southern as middle class or posh. Except if you lol go too far south to Devon or Cornwall where folk like me sound retarded! Still waiting for my wife copy to turn up!
The cornish accent is now forever immortalised (badly) through the medium of samwise gamgee....I've noticed that posh accents transcend location, its about breeding. For example, at university there was a girl doing the agriculture degree that I shared a few lectures with, and she had a really upper class accent - marbles in the mouth, that sort of thing - and she was from scotland. She certainly didn't have a scottish accent, forbid the thought.
Mod
Yeah Hazel, you are bang on. Altringham buts on to Mosside.. Extreme weath next to Poverty. Where I live you Have Salcome, where all the celebs/footballers live, 20 mins down the road you have Plymouth, known as England's Detroit. With more crime per square mile than anywhere else in England, simply that the population is small that it keeps it low on the stats. Here we have the Navy, that Hate the Marines, who are also here. Both hate the locals. A ferry to France/Europe that drugs flow through. Weekends it is a battle. We have one of the two only classified RED bars in the country, in that every week a patron goes into intensive care through third party trauma. Weekend is a full on war zone. I worked the doors for 25 years and loved it, Far from posh!
I finished to book...and am free to discuss. Go!
Mod
Did you end up liking it more than you than you did in message 17?
Melki wrote: "Did you end up liking it more than you than you did in message 17?"
No. But, that may make for good discussion? I love ripping books apart *rubs hands together and chuckles to himself*
I haven't started yet either, I wanted to get Why Evolution is True out of the way first.
I was thinking about this book - b/c my copy is overdue at the library - and I feel this is one of those books that might make a better movie.I know...I can't believe I said that. I feel there were a lot of face contorting references that lost a lot on the page and would be better suited for the screen.
I've only just started reading it, but I find myself copying the description given for the facial contortions, in order to work out whats meant.. I'm wondering if thats part of the point, and part of the joke, in the same way as when you feed a baby, you'll open your mouth in sympathy with them.
Mod
Even though he's American, I'm picturing Robert Morse (as he appeared in the film version of The Loved One) as Dixon --- and everything's in black and white.
I think Dixon's name is bang on ... he is a D*&$.I can't picture exactly what he looks like, I'm picturing Robert Downey Jr. a bit?
I originally imagined him as Daniel Craig, but shorter and a bit rounder, because they said he was northern, but then they increased the description to say he was western and not eastern, meaning he's either from Lancashire (manchester, Wigan etc) or he's from Cumbria, so he's no longer a short dumpy daniel craig.However, he is slowly turning into Martin Freeman, even though Martin has the wrong accent, I reckon he'd be capable of it.
Mod
Next time I make a film, I'm hiring Hazel as my casting director.
You mean the hobbit guy?! Not picturing that at all. But, I should have, then the book would have been a bit funnier.
Anyone find themselves laughing out loud when they read this book? Or is it a quiet chuckle?
Mod
I like that I honestly have no clue what will happen next.
Hope to finish today.
I was talking about they way Jim is with my other half esterday, and said I liked him, despite behaviour that meant I shouldn't... and my other half said "are you sure you like him, or is it simply that you just dislike him less than the others?"I think this may actually be the case.
I found the further I read the more I hated Jim...not sure why though b/c I can relate to his life very easily. He falls into a career he hates, despises the people he works for & hates the social obligations he has to take part in to keep his job...mmm sounds a lot like the part of my life I loath. Great, time to call my therapist again...thanks for bringing this up guys!As for the other characters, I didn't mind the professor (and found his driving scenes funny) but all the other characters were very unlikable.
Was that one of the points of the book? Is that funny to some?
I once read the beginning of a book
where the main character was just vile, but, not in a villian type way. He was just an a&$hole; raped fairies and would not help out the troubled fairy-myth land when he had the power to. I couldn't finish the book b/c of this character.Dixon reminds me of him. Seems Dixon is not evil, just a bit self-centred and lazy?
I did find the writing, as in choice of words, very funny and entertaining at parts. Here are a couple of examples just off the top of my head.
1) It was the perfect title, in that it crystallised the article's niggling mindlessness, it's funeral parade of yawn-enforcing facts, the pseudo-light it threw upon non-problems.
2) As the traffic thickened slightly towards the town, the driver added to his hypertrophied caution a psychopathic devotion to the interest of other road-users; the sight of anything between a removal-van and a junior bicycle halved his speed to a four miles an hour and sent his hand, Dixon guessed, flapping in a slow motion St. Vitus' dance of beckoning and wavings-on.
WoW! That is a mouthful!
Mod
Amis's writing style reminds me of Evelyn Waugh - and I've read ONE whole book by him, so that makes me an expert!
As far as not liking ANY of the characters...believe it or not, it reminded me of "Seinfeld". I hated Jerry, Elaine, George, and even Kramer individually, yet they all worked well together to create great entertainment.
I thought the lecture scene was very well done, with Dixon looking out over a crowd comprised of just about everyone he loves, hates, wants to impress, or has royally pissed off over the course of the story.
Jim truly is a lucky man. He bumbles along from one thing to the next. Opportunities just seem to present themselves with no effort on his part - kind of like the film career of Steve Gutenberg.
I like that Jim was not a changed man. There was no Scroogian transformation, no vow to be a better person.
It was essentially a happy ending, but there are hints that ole Jim will need lots more luck in the future.
I've realised what it is about this book that keeps ringing a bell. It reminds me of Peep Show, which for anyone who hasn't seen/heard of it is a british comedy about 2 guys who share a flat, one of whom is a neurotic, socially awkward pedant, and the other is work shy, slobby "free spirit". The reason this book reminds me of it is because in the show, each shot is done from the point of view of one of these two characters, so in 1st person, and they have a regular internal monologue that you can hear from each of them. Its painful to watch at times, and its just like Jim and the way the book is basically all from his point of view with all his prejudices and thinking the horrible and ridiculous things that he won't articulate. Again, neither of the two characters in Peep Show is really likeable, because you hear what they're thinking, and if we ever heard what other people were thinking half the time, we probably wouldn't like them very much.i don't know if you'll be able to see this outside of the UK:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0-ezI...
Mod
Jim didn't change, you are right there...and that's something I didn't really like about the book.I also found the story went nowhere, but, in the same sense Jim's world changed dramatically from beginning to end - he was lucky.
I liked the part when he got drunk and slept spread eagle on the bed...and then burned it?! That was actually pretty funny.
The lecture was pretty good too, with the heckles from the gallery and his friend passing out...I kept wishing, while reading the book, that there would be more 'extreme' situations like this. I guess I just like extremes, I find that funny.
Mod
It looks good up there. That cover you have is ten times more interesting than the cover I had.I was thinking about the humour in this book. I think it would make a better play than movie; furthermore, a better play than book; a better play than graphic novel as well...opinions?
Mod
Lucky Jim is a 1957 British comedy film directed by John Boulting and starring Ian Carmichael, Terry-Thomas and Hugh Griffith. (wiki)
It's not available through Netflix.
I may have to find and watch that. Terry Thomas was great in School for Scoundrels. It had Ian Carmicheal in that too, and Alastair Sim.
The Humour Club
Books mentioned in this topic
The One Tree (other topics)The Loved One (other topics)
Lucky Jim (other topics)
And we have a winner!
The title for our first ever group read is Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis.
Were Mr. Amis still alive, he would receive an all-expenses paid trip to Peoria, a gift certificate to the Michael C. Fina gift company, and a Garfield Chia Pet.
Instead, his estate will have the satisfaction of knowing that one or two people from this group will be reading his book.
See ya next month!