Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A mammoth of a book because it covers a man’s entire life (and a little before), from WW2 to 2021. McEwan is clearly trying to show the ways that history and current events touch our lives. He makes some allusions to this idea through the main character, an observant and somewhat lost, passive main character, Roland. Roland is an interesting life to follow, not because he’s an exceptional character, but his commentary on world events and the course of his life felt like a life of perhaps wasted potential, but not without love or happiness. Even the very despicable Merriam Cornell and the sexual abuse is cast in a complicated light of desire, grief, and later, anger. Well, a scene that felt disappointing to me was his confrontation. I felt it disappointing that 1) Roland was spelling out his feelings for Merriam more concisely than someone who has repressed that trauma for years, and 2) even though he was spelling it out, it lacked emotional charge and I couldn’t get a grasp of his mental state. It felt unrealistically clean, for a scene that has been building up from the beginning of the book.
Ok but I really liked his second wife, Daphne and their relationship that was built on comfortable love. I appreciated the depiction of an untraditional but loving household. I felt Daphne redeemed many aspects of Roland’s life. When she’s dying and she starts to share her early memories, you start to get the sense that every character lives a life as expansive as Roland.
McEwan a bit of a heavier handed, more illustrious writer than I’m using to reading. It took me a while to get into this, but when it does, it starts to translate into a movie. I guess that’s why I found this novel a bit of a mixture between a good story, really focused on narrative, and a telling story, really focused on theme. This is shown when Roland tells you exactly what he’s thinking. The mix was sometimes well done and sometimes not well done enough for me. A well done section was the section of his life during the Berlin Wall.
Ok but I really liked his second wife, Daphne and their relationship that was built on comfortable love. I appreciated the depiction of an untraditional but loving household. I felt Daphne redeemed many aspects of Roland’s life. When she’s dying and she starts to share her early memories, you start to get the sense that every character lives a life as expansive as Roland.
McEwan a bit of a heavier handed, more illustrious writer than I’m using to reading. It took me a while to get into this, but when it does, it starts to translate into a movie. I guess that’s why I found this novel a bit of a mixture between a good story, really focused on narrative, and a telling story, really focused on theme. This is shown when Roland tells you exactly what he’s thinking. The mix was sometimes well done and sometimes not well done enough for me. A well done section was the section of his life during the Berlin Wall.