The Right to an Answer (Masterplots II: British and Commonwealth Fiction Series)
At a glance:
- Author: Anthony Burgess
- First Published: 1960
- Type of Work: Social satire
- Time of Work: After World War II, perhaps the late 1950’s
- Setting: A suburb of London, Ceylon, and Tokyo
- Principal Characters: J. W. Denham, Bert Denham, Mr. Raj, Walter Winter (Winterbottom), Alice Winter, Everett, Imogen Everett, Ted Arden
- Genres: Long fiction, Satire
- Subjects: 1950’s, Values, Philosophy or philosophers, Sex or sexuality, Adultery, Moral conditions, London, Tokyo
- Locales: London, England, Tokyo, Japan, Sri Lanka
The Novel
In the opening lines of The Right to an Answer, the expatriate narrator and protagonist, J. W. Denham, reveals his purpose: “I want to clarify in my own mind the nature of the mess that so many people seem to be in nowadays.” The mess to which he refers is both “social and moral.” For Denham, life in postwar England revolves around the television and the pub, with the most common activities being drinking and adultery. The irony is that he sees this mess only once every two years (for approximately six weeks), when he returns from his post in a...
[The entire page is 2531 words long]
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