A Short Answer

by Stanley Middleton

For some time now readers in this country have been rediscovering that there is a life—rich and strange—which goes on outside London. The reawakened interest in the lives and activities of people in what are called ‘the provinces’ may be further stimulated by this poised and exact novel. Stanley Middleton doesn't protest that the world of the Midlands is unique: he knows it, and writes about it with absolute assurance. His hero is l’homme moyen sensuel—but with all the dozens of differences that each average man has from his neighbour. Sam is a character with great curiosity, liveliness and scepticism. Imagine his surprise, therefore, when he is granted what can only be an immediate experience of the divine. Sam is baffled but not really perturbed. His investigations into the meaning of his experience don’t prevent him from a flirtation with the professor’s wife next door, nor from continuing the social ascent into greener pastures.
  A Short Answer is a picaresque novel—racy, artfully dissecting and serious—about one man confronted with more of a challenge than he thinks himself capable of answering. The author himself lives in ‘the provinces’ and spends some of his spare time in such restful pastimes as music and cricket. But neither music nor cricket would have prepared us for so strong an achievement of the serious in comic form.

238 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1958

About the author

Stanley Middleton wrote 45 novels, including 1974's Booker Prize-winner Holiday. A Cautious Approach was his last novel.