Three Rooms

by Jo Hamya · read January 2, 2022

Review

Initially this seemed like the kind of book I would really like, but it fell flat for me. I might have enjoyed it more if I had attended Oxford or if I knew anything about British politics. I don't think I understood the book at all, but my current hypothesis is that it was a satire about self-consciousness.

It seemed to me that even the highest echelons of power existed by virtue of their quarters; would be loath to give them up. I supposed it was not an entirely illogical proposition. Perhaps what the rampant racism, anti-immigration policy, and classism came down to was an arbitrarily powerful group of people wanting to preserve a world which could birth them into secure rooms; give them dorms in Eton and Oxford, chambers in Westminster, then a pension and country house to retire in.

Julia Cooke © 2023