Representations of Intellectuals in Changing Places: A Tale of Two Campuses (1975): An Existentialist View

This study analyzes the characters of David Lodge’s novel, Changing Places: A Tale of Two Campuses in the light of the philosophy of Existentialism. As Sartre has argued, the existence of a person comes before his essence. A person interprets this existence through external factors. Stripped of these factors, his/her existence constitutes his essence. Yet, the way of dealing with the external factors like social roles constitute his/her real essence. Hence, when stuck between these two essences, a person is likely to experience existential crisis. The characters who reflect these crises mostly appear in the novels written after 1950. With this study, the existential crises of the protagonists, their quests for identity and purpose as intellectuals are analyzed, and the novel, which was generally analyzed in terms of its parodical elements formerly, is reread with a different view. This analysis also sheds light on the situation of today’s academic world