Rating: 
Summary: Possibly the funniest book ever written.
Review: As a teenager I reveled in the picaresque, occasionally perverse, peregrinations of Fielding's "Tom Jones." Hours of watching Laurel and Hardy and The 3 Stooges had convinced me that literature was incapable of affording the same intensity of pleasure. But Fielding's writing showed me otherwise. Nevertheless, I had never experienced the power of literature to induce uncontrollable physical laughter, akin to the audible response resonating throughout a movie theater, until reading "Small World." Never mind the parody of the Parsifal legend or grail quest, the rewriting of "The Fairie Queen" and "The Wasteland," or the send-up of not merely current literary criticism but many of its celebrated gurus. My wife had none of this background, and yet when I read the novel out loud to her, she was no less incapacitated by the force of the farce than I had been during my first reading (no, I don't think she was laughing at my recitation).One caveat: I thought the novel would provide college students with an excellent introduction to numerous archetypal themes, canonical works, and schools of literary theory. Forget it. A generation brought up on Pauly Shore and Adam Sandler seems incapable of finding humor, let alone meaning, in language as well crafted as Lodge's.
Rating:
Summary: Marvelous, intricate, well-crafted web of academe
Review: Close behind a delightful read of Lodge's "Trading places", I quickly moved to the second part of his trilogy. "Places" was very good and "World" is even better. Moving ahead ten years in time from "Places", Lodge shows an absolutely superb ability to mesh the globe-trotting, incestuous, backbiting and networking world of university professors of literature. Zapp and Swallow are back for a colorful encore. For any well-traveled academic, or even those who travel for other reasons, you will enjoy Lodge's descriptions, insights and surprising intricacies, as characters jet across continents to yet another subsidized conference, never forgetting that the rationale for the conference is not what it is advertised to be. As any professional, well-published academic knows, the real reason to write papers to present at conferences is to be able to justify traveling to the conference where most if not all agree that there is little reason to actually read or listen to the presentations. Yet beyond the trysts and tripe of these fools can be found lessons in life and romance, of the great pursuit of life. Look past the lust, the deception and the pettiness, as Lodge presents plenty of food for thought. Lodge colors his well-drawn players with all the affectations of their profession: greed, pettiness, ego, banality. A wonderful job. "Small world" is a great, most pleasant summer escape, a humorous jab at the soft underbelly of college life -- without ever really teaching a course.
Rating:
Summary: Academic pinball
Review: David Lodge's Small World is an amusing, entertaining look at the world of academia, particularly the world of English literature, and all of the ridiculous people who inhabit it. I truly enjoy Lodge's work, but I have to say, this isn't my favorite. It's still terrific, but, in my opinion, not his strongest work. It starts off a little slow and many of the characters, while funny, are a bit predictable. I also think this novel didn't really stand the test of time. That being said, it is a funny and engaging read, certain to make you chuckle and even laugh out loud. It's just not Lodge's best work, but Lodge on a bad day is still infinitely better than most other writers on a good day.
Rating: 
Summary: Amusing and Entertaining
Review: David Lodge's Small World is an amusing, entertaining look at the world of academia, particularly the world of English literature, and all of the ridiculous people who inhabit it. I truly enjoy Lodge's work, but I have to say, this isn't my favorite. It's still terrific, but, in my opinion, not his strongest work. It starts off a little slow and many of the characters, while funny, are a bit predictable. I also think this novel didn't really stand the test of time. That being said, it is a funny and engaging read, certain to make you chuckle and even laugh out loud. It's just not Lodge's best work, but Lodge on a bad day is still infinitely better than most other writers on a good day.
Rating:
Summary: His New Novel Is Awaited
Review: From 'Changing Places' through 'Small World' to 'Nice Work', and from 'How Far You Can Go' through 'Paradise News' to 'Therapy', David Lodge, who is a successor of one of the best parts of the tradition of British novels-- the human relationships in society and a lot of comical accidents by the clumsiness of the thoughts and acts, continued to make brilliant novels, along the 2 lines--1) the humor generated by university life or academism itself 2) the sexual freedom and the matter about Catholicism. One of the most impressive reviews on Lodge I have ever read is that one is happy because one has a contemporary writer of one's own and can grow older and have more knowledge of life with him . I reread his many novels this year. I enjoyed 'Small World' most because of its fullness and richness, an ardent lover and une belle dame sans merci, and funny, facetious situations, and 'Paradise News' because of the sympathy aroused by the hero and the paradisiacal Hawaii. Every time I read, I am fascinated by his prose: its wit and the way he uses relatives or a participle construction. I wait for a Lodge new novel as eagerly as, or more eagerly than a Pinchon's.
Rating:
Summary: A great book, but hardly funny as many critics "pin" it
Review: Here I am reviewing a book all about critics! I am amazed that the author, David Lodge, could turn literary conventions and their participants (boring english professors) into such an engaging novel. I really fell for this book, I'm almost sure if I read this book again I'd be stunned by all the ingenious subtletys I may have missed.
Talk about stringing it all together! How did Mr. Lodge manage to handle so many characters, settings (every corner of the world), and all the intertwining stories simultaneously occuring with such ease and cunning insight? I'm convinced (after reading this book) that David Lodge is a gifted story teller and first rate literary mind. May I point out that there are some racy bits interspersed within these 339 pages, but It isn't gratuituous as I thought when I began reading the book; stick with it and Lodge will clear up what you may at first think distasteful.
Rating:
Summary: A great book, but hardly funny as many critics "pin" it
Review: Here I am reviewing a book all about critics! I am amazed that the author, David Lodge, could turn literary conventions and their participants (boring english professors) into such an engaging novel. I really fell for this book, I'm almost sure if I read this book again I'd be stunned by all the ingenious subtletys I may have missed.
Talk about stringing it all together! How did Mr. Lodge manage to handle so many characters, settings (every corner of the world), and all the intertwining stories simultaneously occuring with such ease and cunning insight? I'm convinced (after reading this book) that David Lodge is a gifted story teller and first rate literary mind. May I point out that there are some racy bits interspersed within these 339 pages, but It isn't gratuituous as I thought when I began reading the book; stick with it and Lodge will clear up what you may at first think distasteful.
Rating:
Summary: Even better than the original
Review: How often does a sequel far surpass an original (particularly when the original was very, very good)? "Small World" has the same great humor that made "Changing Places" so fun to read, but is so much more ambitious, multi-layered, and introduces even more hilarious characters. The book at first seems intimidating because so many different characters and plotlines are introduced that it is easy to think the book will be hard to follow. It is to David Lodge's credit that this never happens. Each character and plotline is distinct and original enough that one never gets confused as to who is who and what is going on with each character. As a former English major, I can vouch for the amount of pointless gobbledygook masquerading as intelligent discourse by many English professors. It is important to know, though, that one does not need to be a student of English Literature to fully appreciate "Small World". The characters in this book, although primarily all English professors, can just as easily represent those overambitious people that can be found in any industry who are looking for the most amount of money and prestige, while having to do the least amount of actual work.
Rating:
Summary: been there
Review: I am an academic and I must say that this book nails the academic world to the wall in a way that is somehow wicked and sweet at the same time. The pretension, the meanness, the self-absorption, the lack of social skills, the pettiness, the competition for attention and glory. All too true. I especially enjoyed the clever superimposition of the Grail legend on a tale of modern English professors pursuing a UNESCO endowed chair that entails no academic duties. Persse McGarrigle (Percival), the Irish innocent. Morris Zapp (Merlin), the canny but cynical sage. Morgana Fulvia (Morgan le Fay), the decadent, hypocritical Italian witch. They and the others are all here playing their time-honored rolls. The coincidences come so thick and fast in this book that you very quickly get used to them. It is a good joke to make the entire world as small as academia, a place where you run into the same people again and again whether you want to or not. It was a pleasure to read a book whose prose was devoid of trickery, over-cleverness and gimmicks. Here is a modern novel in a world increasingly full of post-modern works that are too often little more than cleverly constructed rooms full of mirrors. Lodge makes several funny, well-deserved swipes at post-modernism's negative effect on literary criticism.
Rating:
Summary: More than an academic satire
Review: I approached this book with a bit of trepidation, which I ought to explain before my review. Small World is sort of a sequel to Nice Work (it has some of the same characters and locations, but doesn't rely on knowledge of its predecessor). I read Nice Work a few years ago and was put off by it. It wasn't that I didn't find the satire on academia to be humorous. Rather, I thought it was a bit tasteless for someone who had spent most of his adult life employed by universities to turn around and write a satire that was (IMO) often bitter to the point of being unfair. So, I wasn't sure I wanted to read Small World, though I had been assured it was a better book. I am glad I finally overcame my resistance and read it, because it is a much better book; indeed I think it is a very good book. Small World is also a satire on academia, and while all the jacket blurbs talk about how biting the satire is, I didn't find that to be the case. Lodge seemed much more in tune and sympathetic with his characters, even as he skewers their antics. Also, the attacks in this novel seem less personal and more on literary studies as a profession. I actually think Lodge has much bigger ambitions in this novel than writing an academic satire. His goal, it seems to me, is to package the history of the novel into a story in the form of an academic satire. So instead of a relatively simple, satirical plot (as in Nice Work), Lodge gives us a multitude of interwoven plots. He has a standard comic plot, but he also has a thriller plot, several varieties of romantic plots, a few mistaken identity plots, a foundling plot, a reunion plot and probably several others I'm forgetting. As the characters move around the world, they move in and out of the various plots. Some of the great moments in the book are watching how the characters react and change as they move from the comic plot to the thriller plot to one of the romance plots. Because Lodge is writing about Literature academics and has designed the novel to borrow from many different genres and eras, he gets to show off his extensive literary knowledge as well. The novel is littered with quotations (attributed and unattributed) and allusions (acknowledge and unacknowledged). I had fun trying to pick out these bits as I was reading, but you don't need to catch the allusions to enjoy the book. Overall, I highly recommend the book.
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