''Floating Down to Camelot'' is a

campus novel A campus novel, also known as an academic novel, is a novel whose main action is set in and around the campus of a university. The genre in its current form dates back to the early 1950s. ''The Groves of Academe'' by Mary McCarthy, published in 19 ...

David Benedictus David Henry Benedictus (born 16 September 1938) is an English writer and theatre director, best known for his novels. His work includes the Winnie-the-Pooh novel ''Return to the Hundred Acre Wood'' (2009). It was the first such book in 81 years. ...

published in 1985 and set in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

. The title is drawn from

Tennyson Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of his ...

's poem ''

The Lady of Shalott "The Lady of Shalott" is a lyrical ballad by the 19th-century English poet Alfred Tennyson and one of his best-known works. Inspired by the 13th-century Italian short prose text '' Donna di Scalotta'', the poem tells the tragic story of Elain ...

'', in which while floating down to

Camelot Camelot is a castle and court associated with the legendary King Arthur. Absent in the early Arthurian material, Camelot first appeared in 12th-century French romances and, since the Lancelot-Grail cycle, eventually came to be described as the ...

the Lady of Shalott apparently dies of a broken heart, caused by the rejection of

Sir Lancelot Lancelot du Lac (French for Lancelot of the Lake), also written as Launcelot and other variants (such as early German ''Lanzelet'', early French ''Lanselos'', early Welsh ''Lanslod Lak'', Italian ''Lancillotto'', Spanish ''Lanzarote del Lago' ...

. Benedictus began to write the novel while he was a fellow commoner at

Churchill College, Cambridge Churchill College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. It has a primary focus on science, engineering and technology, but still retains a strong interest in the arts and humanities. In 1958, a trust was establish ...

, and a Judith E. Wilson visiting

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

in the

University A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...

Principal characters

*Bill, a

undergraduate Undergraduate education is education conducted after secondary education and before postgraduate education. It typically includes all postsecondary programs up to the level of a bachelor's degree. For example, in the United States, an entry-lev ...

, believes in

free will Free will is the capacity of agents to choose between different possible courses of action unimpeded. Free will is closely linked to the concepts of moral responsibility, praise, culpability, sin, and other judgements which apply only to actio ...

, but suffers from extreme poverty. *Helen, an impressionable Cambridge student of

English literature English literature is literature written in the English language from United Kingdom, its crown dependencies, the Republic of Ireland, the United States, and the countries of the former British Empire. ''The Encyclopaedia Britannica'' defines E ...

. *Lance, an American reading

Natural Sciences Natural science is one of the branches of science concerned with the description, understanding and prediction of natural phenomena, based on empirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such as peer review and repeatab ...

. *John, a Cambridge don who teaches

determinism Determinism is a philosophical view, where all events are determined completely by previously existing causes. Deterministic theories throughout the history of philosophy have developed from diverse and sometimes overlapping motives and consi ...

but who suffers from randomness in his own life. *Gillian, John's wife, who sees signs of divine intervention even in the game of

Scrabble ''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, read left t ...

. *Olaf, who always wears beige - "wool or tweed or synthetics, but always beige". *Buzz, also known as 'The Duck'.

Summary

When Bill, an impoverished Cambridge student, is even unable to pay for his mother's funeral, his thoughts turn to crime. However, a friend warns him that "To have no money is to join the aristocracy, Bill. When the day comes for you to have it, you will have left the aristocracy, never to return." Another central character, Helen, an undergraduate reading

, lacks stability in her life and finds her main solace in

poetry Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings i ...

and particularly in the romantic medieval work of Tennyson. Her obsession with ''The Lady of Shalott'', and her identification with the lady of the poem, bring her to a fatal ending.Christian Gutleben, ''Nostalgic postmodernism: the Victorian tradition and the contemporary British novel'' (Rodopi, 2001, )
pp. 21-22
online Helen has been seduced by the medieval romances of the

Victorian era In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwardia ...

but does not wish to be seduced by Bill. Lance, a scientist, hopes to save the world, but the effect of his experiments on Helen is less positive. Meanwhile, the Cambridge rapist is at large. "This is the world of bedsitter girls, of Auden and Betjeman and

Brian Patten Brian Patten (born 7 February 1946) is an English poet and author. He came to prominence in the 1960s as one of the Liverpool poets, and writes primarily lyrical poetry about human relationships. His famous works include "Little Johnny's Confessio ...

." By buying a

Donald Duck Donald Fauntleroy Duck is a cartoon character created by The Walt Disney Company. Donald is an anthropomorphic white duck with a yellow-orange bill, legs, and feet. He typically wears a sailor shirt and cap with a bow tie. Donald is known fo ...

mask for bank robbing purposes, Bill unwittingly identifies himself with the rapist. In the course of a week during the

Michaelmas term Michaelmas term is the first academic term of the academic year in a number of English-speaking universities and schools in the northern hemisphere, especially in the United Kingdom. Michaelmas term derives its name from the Feast of St Micha ...

, the tensions and interplay between the leading characters lead not only to bank robbery, but also to ritual

castration Castration is any action, surgical, chemical, or otherwise, by which an individual loses use of the testicles: the male gonad. Surgical castration is bilateral orchiectomy (excision of both testicles), while chemical castration uses pharmaceut ...

transvestism Transvestism is the practice of dressing in a manner traditionally associated with the opposite sex. In some cultures, transvestism is practiced for religious, traditional, or ceremonial reasons. The term is considered outdated in Western c ...

, and a fatal car crash. "From the Whipple Museum to the University Arms Hotel, intellectuals and tourists turned pale. What could have caused it, this catastrophic sound?" The novel includes many quotations, not only from Tennyson but also from

Thomas Hood Thomas Hood (23 May 1799 – 3 May 1845) was an English poet, author and humorist, best known for poems such as " The Bridge of Sighs" and "The Song of the Shirt". Hood wrote regularly for ''The London Magazine'', ''Athenaeum'', and ''Punch''. ...

William Thackeray William Makepeace Thackeray (; 18 July 1811 – 24 December 1863) was a British novelist, author and illustrator. He is known for his satirical works, particularly his 1848 novel '' Vanity Fair'', a panoramic portrait of British society, and t ...

, and W. H. Auden.

Analysis

According to one critic, "''Floating Down to Camelot'' is a merciless novel about the loss of landmarks and the state of disorder in the contemporary English society. All the traditional sources of stability... are here ruthlessly debunked." Another analysis suggests that "the narrator of David Benedictus's ''Floating Down to Camelot'' epitomizes the ludic quest... But the emphasis is so ostentatiously on the comic process rather than on the derided target that the ludic seems to eradicate the

satiric Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or e ...

. The book is considered of enough significance to be listed in Graham Chainey's ''A Literary History of Cambridge''. Perhaps surprisingly, the ''American Jewish Year Book'' for 1987 considered it to be a "new fictional work of Jewish interest".David Singer, Ruth R. Seldin, ''American Jewish Year Book, 1987'', p. 216

Notes

{{David Benedictus 1985 British novels English novels Novels set in the University of Cambridge Novels by David Benedictus