Amsterdam by Ian McEwan
London: Jonathan Cape, 1998 ISBN 0224051709
A novel that was not at all what I expected and perhaps an outlier in terms of winners of the Booker Prize. This is the first Ian McEwan book I have read, and for some reason I had in my mind that he was only a writer of serious, "worthy" and dense fiction. Thinking about that I wonder if that's because I formed an opinion entirely from looking at the covers of his books, not to mention the portentous (usually one-word) titles.
So to Amsterdam, with its image of nineteenth-century duellists on the cover of my (second) hardback edition. The first pages of the book, where four lovers of the same woman (Molly) attend her funeral, are indeed portentous. The lovers are: an editor of a London newspaper, a famous composer, the Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom and Molly's husband, a publisher.
We soon learn that Vernon (the editor) and Clive (the composer) are friends even if they were rivals at one stage for Molly's affections. We learn that both of them loathe Julian (the Foreign Secretary) both for his politics and the fact that he took Molly away from them. Naturally they feel unkindly toward George (the husband) for officially "winning" Molly, and for refusing them permission to visit during the final days of her illness, which we learn was both physically and mentally degrading.
In the next section of the novel the reader discovers that Vernon is engaged in a battle with his staff to turn around his paper's fortunes - he intends to take it more "downmarket", to the disgust of much of the longstanding staff ("the Grammarians"). Clive meanwhile is working on a commission to write a symphony. Rocked by the manner of Molly's death, Clive asks Vernon if he would see Clive euthanized if he sunk to Molly's level. Vernon agrees, on the proviso that Clive would do the same for him.
Meanwhile George, who happens to have a financial interest in the paper Vernon runs, shows Vernon some pictures Molly had taken, of Julian in drag, which as it turns out is his secret vice.. Vernon realises this is his chance to destroy Julian personally and politically. He goes to Clive for advice and they have a blazing argument - Clive cannot see Julian's point of view at all.
Clive goes to the Lake District to try and get inspiration to finish his symphony all the time brooding over his row with Vernon. While walking, Clive witnesses a man attacking a woman at the very moment he receives the inspiration he needs to finish his symphony. Instead of helping the woman, he chooses to write down his thoughts.
Vernon goes ahead with the plan to publish the photos of Julian, and the pre-publicity begins to turn around the paper's fortunes. A junior staffer comes to him to let him know that much of the staff is in fact behind him but too fearful of the Grammarians to speak out, which fortifies Vernon. However, the day before publication Julian's wife holds a press conference where she reveals the photographs and stands by her husband. Julian has been out-manoeuvred by his junior staff who takes over the paper. Clive sees the paper and is disgusted in Vernon and sends him a postcard stating he should be sacked.
Meanwhile, thinking back to a conversation with Clive about his trip, Vernon realises that Clive had witnessed an attack from a serial rapist, and rings Clive to tell him to go to the police. Clive refuses because he is in the middle of finishing his symphony. Another argument ensues, and Vernon rings the police to let them know Clive was a witness.
These actions destroy the friendship, with both Clive and Vernon (illogically) feeling that the other had sabotaged their careers. It's here the story turns to farce. They both independently determine that the other had gone mad, and so under the terms of their pact it was their duty to euthanize the other.
They meet in Amsterdam, where Clive is rehearsing his symphony (which is a failure because Vernon had sent the police around just as Clive was inspired for a grand finale to the piece, which he never got to complete). Both of them have employed dodgy euthanasia doctors to do each other in, which is duly what happens.
The novel ends with Julian and George escorting the bodies home. While riding out the photograph scandal and staying in parliament, Julian's dreams of becoming Prime Minister are dashed. George has the final lines, relishing his "victory" over the other lovers, and contemplating a memorial service for Molly where his relationship with her takes centre stage.
The story is clearly absurd, yet it is compulsively readable. It starts very much as a novel of middle-class manners and morals, populated by the sort of people you might meet in a book by Le Carre. McEwan has indulged in his love of music and the countryside with the character of Clive - we are treated to many pages of description of composing, and walking through the Lake Country, which well convey the deep sense of joy that can come from those activities. McEwan also has a fine grasp of the particularities of middle-class England which he describes well.
Is there deeper meaning in this book? It's a short book with a strong narrative drive, but it does delve into the meaning of friendship, the moral choices we make, and how we have an endless capacity to deceive ourselves. Vernon thinks he's outsmarting everyone while he's being outsmarted by his junior, Clive starts to think that he is a genius, only for the reader to be told at the end of the novel that his symphony was a pastiche.
The fragility of friendship and our failure to grasp other's point of view are also on display, coming from an impossibility to truly know one another - "[w]e lay mostly submerged, like ice floes with our visible social selves projecting only cool and white." Ultimately the book centres around the moral choices the characters make - while he takes all this to absurd lengths, he makes his points with sharp painful jabs - the choices make the reader gasp at times.
All that being written, I'm not sure how to take this novel - is it a comment on middle-class morals, is it a comment on being wary of judging other's choices, or is it just a good, darkly humorous, story? It's definitely a page-turner but perhaps, for a Booker winner, a little too lightweight. A good novel, but not a great one.
A View Over the Bell
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