Meritocrats

by Stuart Evans, M.J. Nicholls (Introduction)

Stuart Evans’s first novel is a comedy-of-ill-manners set in a nouveau riche a fantastic satirical performance and hyper-referential homage to masters past and present. Paul Keller is the Stephen Dedalus of the piece, the son of Robert and Sylvie, whose internal monologue is spliced into the action, and whose incestuous feelings for his sister lead to an increase in histrionic imagery. Sylvie Keller’s sections comprise of pastiches, including the Penelope chapter of Ulysses , and an amusing riff on Alain Robbe-Grillet. Robert Keller, the paterfamilias, has a more conventional narration, while Eric Foster, “vernissage of the independent cinema”, is the most intriguing a cinematographic narration, blending snippets from his screenplays, pieces of real-time dialogue, and more theoretical musings, mirroring the approach of his movies. Gavin McNamara is the final a caustic internal monologue from an parodic Irish character, sprinkled with amusing portmanteau words. These narrations are sequenced in different orders over eight parts, mimicking the drunken headiness of the endless parties taking place. The end product is a fantastic intellectual romp that transcends its swinging setting and succeeds in impressing with each stylish sentence. “ Meritocrats is an extremely funny book. Although it makes the reader work hard for his pleasure, the reward is great. It is crammed with allusions, quotations, epigrams, aphorisms, and parodies of other novelists from Proust and Joyce to Graham Greene and Iris Murdoch. Stuart Evans aims at “tragical mirth” and scores a brilliant bull’s-eye.” — The Listener “I can scarcely recall a more ambitious first novel than Stuart Evans’s Meritocrats , and few more interesting ones . . . Here is that rarity, a comic novel that not only takes the form seriously but actually tries to extend its scope.” — Norman Shrapnel, The Guardian

302 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1974

About the author

aka Hugh Tracy.

Stuart Evans was born in Swansea in 1934 and brought up at Ystalyfera in Glamorgan. It was as a novelist that he established his reputation, with eight long, technically complex novels which are more inclined to the philosophical than is usual in English fiction. They include Meritocrats (1974), The Gardens of the Casino (1976), The Caves of Alienation (1977), and a quintet known as The Windmill Hill Sequence. He also published two volumes of verse, Imaginary Gardens with Real Toads (1972) and The Function of the Fool (1997). He died in 1994.