Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis and The Edible Woman by...

Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis and The Edible Woman by Margaret Atwood The adolescent years are often associated with turbulence, illusion, and self-discovery; however, Kingsley Amis’s Lucky Jim and Margaret Atwood’s The Edible Woman demonstrate that more often than not, the twenties possess these qualities to a greater extent than adolescence. The age period of the twenties often consists of relationships, employment and self issues and using the premise of these uncertain times, Amis and Atwood effectively satire various societal systems. Moreover, Amis and Atwood both implement the use of the foil, a character who, by contrast with another character, accentuates that character’s distinctive characteristics. In particular,†¦show more content†¦Thus, Jim was inwardly laughing at Christine’s mannerisms and yet, when Carol Goldsmith asks him â€Å"What’s the joke?,† Jim replies â€Å"Oh, nothing† (Amis 50). Thus, Amis uses Christine, one of Jim’s love interests who acts as a foil to Margaret, as a tool to show Jim’s disparity between his outward and inward character. However, towards the climax of Lucky Jim, Jim becomes furious with Bertrand Welch for telling Jim to stay away from Christine and for the first time, Jim reconciles his thought and his action. â€Å"The bloody old towser-faced boot-faced totem-pole on a crap reservation,’ Dixon thought. ‘You bloody old towser-faced boot-faced totem pole on a crap reservation,’ he said† (Amis 209). This signifies the maturation of Jim’s character and the union of his outward and inward personage. Moreover, this character growth would never have occurred without the use of a foil because without the contrast of Christine to Margaret, Jim would have never appreciated Christine’s appealing attributes. Similarly, in The Edible Woman, Atwood shows the maturation of Marian’s character. However, unlike the character of Jim, Marian’s outward and inward character divergence occurs after Marian meets one of her love interests: Duncan. Atwood contrasts Duncan to Peter,