The Right to an Answer Author:Anthony Burgess In the opening lines of The Right to an Answer, the expatriate narrator, J. W. Denham, reveals his purpose: “I want to clarify in my own mind the nature of the mess that so many people seem to be in nowadays.” The mess to which he refers is both “social and moral.” For Denham, life in postwar England revolves aroun... more »d the television and the pub, with the most common activities being drinking and adultery. Denham is a British businessman who lives and works in Japan but who has returned to Leicester, England, because his father is dying. Describing himself as a "professional expatriate", Denham leaves a mistress behind in Tokyo. Denham spends much time seeking sexual sustenance during his UK sojourn and "imbibing liquors of all kinds".
Mr. Raj has recently arrived from Sri Lanka and trying to find his way in British society. He is unfailingly polite but soon shows that he is a man of power. He introduces Denham's father, on the eve of his death, to the delights of fiery Ceylonese curries. He has some less than pleasant surprises up his sleeve for Denham himself.
A darkly comic 1960 novel; one of its themes is the disillusionment of the returning exile. The critic William H Pritchard described the novel in a 1966 publication as "surely Burgess' most engaging novel".« less