Vice Versa

First published in 1882, this comic novel is an early and hugely influential body-swap fantasy. Paul Bultitude, a self-important City merchant, cannot fathom why his son Dick dreads returning to Dr. Grimstone’s boarding school, and he loftily declares that he wishes he were a boy again. A stone brought back from India by Dick’s uncle, said to grant a single wish, takes him at his word. Father and son trade bodies, and the pompous Mr. Bultitude is packed off to school in his son’s place, at the mercy of the cane, the wretched food, and the petty tyrannies he had airily dismissed. Anstey plays the reversal for farce while quietly puncturing Victorian notions about childhood and paternal authority. Its influence runs straight through to Freaky Friday and the switch comedies that followed.