Peter Green’s Final Exam certainly needs some revision. Beginning the novel with a “slimy haven of a crotch” was not promising start, and heralded a story that promised to be over-sexualised and pretentious. The story follows the student life of Peter Green – in what is thankfully not an autobiography – as he swans his way through Cambridge life, which mainly consists of making obscure and unnecessary literary references, using words that I’m fairly sure are a product of Thesaurus-itis – who even knows what ‘lissom’ means anyway? – “contemplating orgasms”, and making multiple references to colleges and street names in a rather transparent attempt to create verisimilitude.

In all fairness, as a fiercely loyal Newnhamite, I may possibly have been biased against the book from the start – hearing my beloved college described as “musty” and inducing of “osmotic fear and guilt” hardly endeared the protagonist or the author to me.

On the other hand, it’s undeniable that Final Exam is really beautifully written. His use of language is, at times, really striking, such as his metaphor for fingernails as “stunning blooms.” To add to this, the structure of the narrative divided up into Exam paper Tripos parts, with an English excerpt at the beginning of each chapter, is inspired.

However, at the risk of revealing myself to be an uncultured, non-Engling student, the main problem with Final Exam is that it seems to be lacking in storyline – Green spends a lot of time ruminating, and very little time going anywhere in any direction with the plot. As any Cambridge student who has ever sat in English lecture knows, literature from all ages seems to have an uncanny knack for making everything into a phallus metaphor, and Final Exam is no exception. There is no doubt that Green is a very erudite writer, but whether Final Exam is everyone’s cup of tea is a different question altogether.

26/11/2014 Editor's note: Varsity has been contacted by the author of Final Exam. He has pointed out that he was misquoted in the review with the phrases "stunning blooms" and "contemplating orgasms". We would like to remind our readers that reviews are personal opinions.