Chapter 5: Lucky Jim

Chapter 5.

You know, I'm finding it really hard to describe wit as seen in these beginning chapters. I mean, it's pretty funny how Amis is using the characters and setting to play a part in the "wit" but exactly what makes these chapters witty, I'm not quite sure yet.
In this chapter, the humor lies in the fact that several characters are coming in and out of the house. A character strategy is the Dixon's is completely drunk and disoriented....he wants to enter the house again yet everywhere he tries to go (example, his kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom), he can't get access too because they are either closed or occupied. The IRONY (o yes, wit is created through irony a LOT in this novel) is that his drunkeness has nothing to do with his inability to get anywhere in his own house. Also, it's funny and ironic here because he sees certain things that he wishes he hadn't (ie the reader sees that Carol and Welch are having an intimate moment...having an affair? The reader does not know yet). They break the social profile because they don't belong to the same social class and during this time, it was not common to see such a moment. That's all the wit I saw in that chapter...It's interesting, so...irony presented through the characters' personalities and actions and the situations they go through is what makes up the wit so far in this novel. Stay tuned :)