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Ian McEwan
On a chilly February day two old friends meet in the throng outside acrematorium to pay their last respects to Molly Lane. Both Clive Linleyand Vernon Halliday had been Molly’s lovers in the days before theyreached their current eminence, Clive as Britain’s most successfulmodern composer, Vernon as editor of the quality broadsheet, The Judge.Gorgeous, feisty Molly had had other lovers too, notably JulianGarmony, Foreign Secretary, a notorious right-winger tipped to be thenext prime minister. In the days that follow Molly’s funeral Clive andVernon will make a pact that will have consequences neither…
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topAbout the Book
On a chilly February day two old friends meet in the throng outside acrematorium to pay their last respects to Molly Lane. Both Clive Linleyand Vernon Halliday had been Molly’s lovers in the days before theyreached their current eminence, Clive as Britain’s most successfulmodern composer, Vernon as editor of the quality broadsheet, The Judge.Gorgeous, feisty Molly had had other lovers too, notably JulianGarmony, Foreign Secretary, a notorious right-winger tipped to be thenext prime minister. In the days that follow Molly’s funeral Clive andVernon will make a pact that will have consequences neither hasforeseen. Each will make a disastrous moral decision, their friendshipwill be tested to its limits and Julian Garmony will be fighting forhis political life. A contemporary morality tale that is as profound asit is witty, this short novel is perhaps the most purely enjoyablefiction Ian McEwan has ever written. And why Amsterdam? What happensthere to Clive and Vernon is the most delicious shock in a novelbrimming with surprises.
topIan McEwan interview/review
Bold Type, October 1988
- Does winning the Booker prize affect your role as a writer or your relationship to writing?
Well, I should hope it doesn’t affect it at all. It’s important to recognise that your book is exactly the same book as it was an hour before the winner was announced. The Booker committee changes every year, and you can have no doubt in your mind that a different committee would have chosen a different book. It’s perfectly possible for me to contemplate Amsterdam not only not winning, but not even being considered. And I therefore think you have to really separate out the outward manifestations of this – which is all great fun – from the business of writing books and not to be deluded into thinking that you are necessarily suddenly promoted and that you are any different kind of writer. I think you have to welcome it, but not quite be too impressed by it.
- Amsterdam was a different kind of novel from your recent work. It’s much shorter, for instance, than Enduring Love. What inspired the change?
For a long time I wanted to get back to the kind of form, the kind of short novel, that could be read in three or four hours, that would be one intact, complete, absorbing literary experience. Part of my ambition for Amsterdam is that the reader would share in the plotting of the book. It’s meant to take pleasures in its own plotting, and I hope the reader is drawn into that.
topStarting Points for Discussion
- Talk about the tone of this novel. Is it ironic? Humorous? Menacing?
- At one early point in the novel, Vernon Halliday thinks this about himself, “[H]e was infinitely diluted; he was simply the sum of all the people who had listened
to him, and when he was alone, he was nothing at all”. Discuss this prescient statement, in light of Vernon’s fate.
- At different points in the novel, both Clive and Vernon think that Clive has given more to their friendship than Vernon has. In both their form and course, do you think friendships can ever be equal?
- How shaky is Clive’s moral foundation? Should he be allowed to condemn his fellow artists who ‘assume the licence of free artistic spirit’ and renege on commitments, even as Clive ignores the plight of a woman he witnesses being attacked?
- Vernon wants to crucify Garmony for the greater good of the republic. Is this ever a valid reason to go after a politician? With such differing stances, on whose side do you ultimately come down on, Clive’s or Vernon’s?
- Consider the importance of Molly’s role in the novel. Are there other examples in literature of characters who carry great weight and importance even though they never appear? How does Molly compare?
Other Books by Ian McEwan
Amsterdam
Atonement
On the hottest day of the summer of 1935, thirteen-year-old Briony Tallis sees…
Suggested Further Reading
- Disgrace ~ J M Coetzee
- How Late It Was, How Late ~ James Kelman
- Black Mischief ~ Evelyn Waugh
- Brideshead Revisited ~ Evelyn Waugh
- The Handmaid’s Tale ~ Margaret Atwood