Nice Work

Nice Work is a 1988 novel by English author David Lodge. It is the third book in Lodge’s Campus trilogy, succeeding Changing Places and Small World: An Academic Romance, which were published in 1975 and 1984, respectively. The novel is a commentary on the social and economic inheritances of England’s Thatcher era, particularly with respect to how its philosophy of corporatization environments shaped people and academia. The characters in the novel are ambivalent about their social roles, occasionally undermining the institutions that claim to support them. The novel comments on themes and traditions including identity capital, feminist philosophy, and the institution of marriage. In writing the novel, Lodge drew from his memories of his brief corporate stint as a shadow for his friend, who worked as an engineer at a large firm. Nice Work won several fiction awards, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

The novel begins in the fictional English city of Rummidge. Robyn Penrose works as a temporary lecturer at Rummidge’s university, where she focuses on women writers and the industrial novel (a mostly retired genre whose conventions and assumptions about life are, ironically, parodied by the text itself). Robyn’s boss, Professor Philip Swallow, leads Rummidge’s English department but is transitioning to his new role as the Dean of the Arts Faculty. During this transition, he has asked her to cover his teaching duties. What begins as a typical teaching assignment unexpectedly changes when Robyn is summoned to observe business at a local factory as part of Rummidge’s “Industry Year Shadow Scheme.” The factory, J. Pringle & Sons Casting & General Engineering, is managed by Vic Wilcox.

Robyn shadows Vic for several months; as they get to know each other, the novel explores their personal lives through several vignettes. Vic’s family includes his wife, Marjorie, father, and children. He and Marjorie do not get along, partly because Vic is overinvested in work. Robyn is not especially close with her family but is in a long-term relationship with her boyfriend, Charles, who is also a scholar of literature. After Robyn finishes her stint at Pringle’s, Vic comes to shadow her while she teaches at Rummidge. This experience causes their academic and industrial worldviews to clash. One of Professor Swallow’s friends, Morris Zapp, visits from an American university called Euphoric State while en route to a conference in Britain. Euphoric State is modeled after the University of California-Berkeley, and Professor Zapp modeled as an archetypal liberal professor.



Zapp expresses his interest in Robyn’s scholarship and connects her to Euphoric State for a possible faculty job. In reality, Zapp is only trying to stir up competition for the post, which he knows is being sought by his ex-wife. Robyn jumps at the opportunity, knowing that funding for humanities programs is dwindling across the country and may soon compromise her position at Rummidge. Almost simultaneously, Vic’s company goes through a merger with another factory, making his role redundant. Good fortune befalls Robyn, and, in turn, Vic, when Robyn learns that one of her Australian relatives has died and left her an inheritance of $300,000. Robyn takes a risk and invests in Vic to fund his idea for a business venture.

At the end of the novel, Vic and Marjorie mend their relationship. Robyn retracts her statement of interest in the teaching job at Euphoric State, choosing instead to remain a temporary lecturer at Rummidge. Eventually, she hopes, she will be able to get a permanent job at Rummidge without having to uproot herself and start again in a new country. Though its two main characters’ philosophies and fields starkly differ, Nice Work suggests that academics and industrialists can support each other.