abstractly Christian, more humanly embodied, than that of the Inklings. Evil, in
JKR’s universe, can be resisted by love, as we can read in the final pages ofThe
Philosopher’s Stone: ‘to have been loved so deeply, even though the person who loved
us is gone, will give us some protection for ever.’ This is surely a good moral. But all
is light and brisk, in contrast to the discomfort and ambiguity of much serious
fiction.
Adults have been known to read JKR, and not to their children. Dr Johnson, when
tired, used to read the romances in which he had delighted as a child. Johnson
thought himself an idle man, writing in The Idlerthat ‘One of the amusements of
idleness is reading without the fatigue of close attention; and the world therefore
swarms with writers whose wish is not to be studied but to be read.’ If Johnson’s
example is anything to go by, those whose early reading is light and miscellaneous
can rise to higher things. In the Introduction to this book, literature was said to
combine literary art and human interest. Does Rowling qualify? She has delighted
millions. Will she, will any of those considered in this chapter, be read in a hundred
years?nFurther reading
Butler, C.,Postmodernism: A Very Short Introduction(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002).
Positive, clear-minded, philosophically informed.
Corcoran, N. (ed.),The Cambridge Companion to Twentieth-Century English Poetry
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007). A collection of commissioned essays.
Hamilton, I. (ed.),The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-Century Poetry in English (Oxford:
Oxfor d University Press, 1994). A well-edited and balanced reference book.
Hulse, M.,D. Kennedy and D. Morley (eds),The New Poe try(Newcastle:Bloodaxe, 1993).
Innes, Christopher,Modern British Drama: 1890–1990 (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1992).A good introduction.
Parker, P. (ed.),The Reader’s Companion to Twentieth-Century Writing (London: Helicon,
1995).
Parrinder, Patrick,Nation and Novel: The English Novel from its Origins to the Present Day
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).
Rennison, N.,Contemporary British Novelists(London: Routledge, 2005). Brief critical
accounts of thirty writers who have published three or more novels since 1980.
Rogers, Jane (ed.),Good Fiction Guide(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). Informal
essays with a concise reference guide, fresh, eclectic, wide-ranging: includes Agatha Christie,
Daphne du Maurier, Emyr Humphries, Primo Levi, Pagnol, Pasternak, Ann Tyler and Edith
Wharto n.
Stevenson, R.,The Last of England, 1960–2000(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). Final
volume in the Oxford English Literary History. A thoughtful survey.
Stringer, J. (ed.),The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-Century Literature in English (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1996). Another well-edited and balanced reference book.
Taylor,D.J.,After the War: The Novel in England since 1945(London:Flamingo, 1994). An
intelligent and engaged account.434 15 · CONTEMPORARIES