A book which came to my notice through its use as an example in a recent book by the narratologist Jens Brockmeier . Or to be more precise, he builds a chapter on less than a page taken from the first part of the book, illustrated left. Or from the top of page 57 of the paperback edition, if you happen to have it to hand. A book billed on the front cover as the No.1 bestseller. It’s coming into my possession was noticed at reference 1.
This post follows close on a first reading. We shall see how well it stands the test of time.
The phenomenon in the middle of the page, being left with a troubling emotion, a troubling feeling, but with no memory of from where it came, is said to be well documented in the psychological literature, although I cannot put my hand to a neat quote just now. Freud knew all about it and more recently there has been interest in connection with those with amnesia and/or dementia: so the hoof mark of someone interested in the psychology of it all.
The book has no contents page but is nevertheless organised into five chapters or parts – we are not told which. Five chapters of very nearly equal length, something over fifty pages each. One wonders at the meaning – if any – of this compromise. Is the author or his editor trying to send us some subtle message? An oversight seems unlikely in this otherwise nicely produced paperback from Vintage.
The book is one of the select band of day in the life stories. Along with those, for example, from James Joyce (type long) and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (type short) – with this one being type medium. The day in the life of a well-heeled neurosurgical consultant who both lives and works somewhere in the vicinity of University College Hospital in London.
It is also the story of the life of a well-heeled London family at the start of the third millennium. How it probably was for people rather better off than most of the readers of the story.
What follows probably best not read if you have yet to read the book.
Some threads
The neurosurgeon – Henry – is pretty much centre stage for the whole book. Mostly third person narrative, but quite a lot of stream-of-consciousness stuff. Quite a lot of memories from his past.
The father-in-law, a reasonably famous poet, living in a large house in France. Serial housekeepers and a problem with drink. The talented daughter follows in her grandfather’s footsteps.
The blues, favoured, followed and performed by the talented son.
The life and times of a surgical team in a major hospital. Who, for example, gets to choose the music? Why do they have music – speaking for myself, I don’t care to have music on when I am doing anything important, other, that is, than listening to the music.
The Goldberg Variations crop up from time to time. Another coincidence, given reference 3.
Some oddments
Various scenes in which we are shown the privileged access that doctors have to their patients and, sometimes, to people in the world at large. Their knowledge gives them a knowledge of people not given to the rest of us. But not, I suppose, so different, say, from the sort of knowledge that the milkman used to have of his round or the plumber has of his customers.
McEwan participates in the modern taste for taking, as it were, the covers off the drains. In common with, for example, Jonathan Franzen. For my own thoughts on this last, see reference 4.
Brockmeier is interested, I think, in the way that the narratives we tell of our lives interact with those lives, with the lives both shaping and being shaped by the narratives. Narratives of what we might have been as well as of what we were; narratives of what we might be or might like to become as well as of what we are or what we are likely to become. But I am not sure, not yet sure anyway, why Brockmeier chose this particular passage from ‘Saturday’ for his text. Or whether McEwan shares his interests.
I don’t think I have read McEwan before, although BH may have and we have seen the film of ‘Atonement’. Notwithstanding, I think that McEwan is interested here in the multi-layered fragility of life. The fragility of the society in which we live and the ease and frequency with which it is disturbed. The fragility of our family life, even that of the comfortable upper middle classes. That of ourselves, so vulnerable to attack by chance, disease, illness or old age. When, for example, we become subject to the accidents of care in homes and care in hospitals. The unpredictability of our shifting moods and emotions. Unusually for a non-scientist, he is, quite soon, to give a discourse at the Royal Institution to which he has given the title ‘Examining the self’. It will be interesting to hear what he has to say – even if, like so many famous people, he disappoints in person, as a lecturer. For some reason, I associate at this point to a memory of Fred Hoyle giving a talk, looking as if he had spilled his breakfast down his front earlier in the day.
A touch of the Aldous Huxley’s, in the sense that sometimes the author’s musings on the state of the world drift up and away from the narrative. Which sometimes irritates.
Page 1, chapter 1
Early morning of a day when we are about to go to war to rid the world of Saddam Hussein. And when lots of people came to London to protest that proposed ridding.
An aeroplane on fire in the early morning sky which might have been a terrorist attack, but wasn’t.
An introduction to the world of a neurosurgeon, his life, his family and his work – on which last McEwan has clearly done his homework – and seemingly having been given considerable access to the subject matter.
Largely set in the Fitzrovia of the ramble noticed at reference 2. A happy chance that we happened to renew our acquaintance with the area at about the same time as I was pointed at this book.
Page 53, chapter 2
Should we attack Saddam Hussein? With the doctor happening to be in closer contact with his violence and cruelty than most of the rest of us. The big demonstration – in part just a happy gathering of like-minded people.
Fitzroy Square, its inhabitants and low-life. The big and expensive Mercedes. The collision off Tottenham Court Road and its sordid, violent aftermath. Introduction to Baxter, a villain with an incurable & fatal neurological complaint. The escape to the unpleasantly violent game of squash with a colleague – with some ambivalence towards that violence.
Page 119, chapter 3
His family. Remembering the row between his daughter and his too well oiled father-in-law. Remembering his short meeting with Blair – when the latter’s mask almost slipped for a moment. Shopping. Remembering his mother’s talent for swimming. Visit to his mother, now with a benign version of dementia, benign in the sense of not shouting and screaming, preserving many of the decencies of life in a care home in Perivale, out on the A40, north of Southall.
Complete with favourable mention of the Westway, my favourite motorway, ever since I spent some months testing the concrete which went into it.
Page 173, chapter 4
Early evening and cooking. Discussion with daughter about the proposed invasion. Arrival of father-in-law and then, a little later, his wife. The shocking intrusion of Baxter and side-kick into the bosom of the family. The comely daughter stripped, more or less at knife point. Saved by a lucky choice of poem. A reasonably happy ending after Baxter has been thrown down the stairs – causing serious damage to his head.
The aftermath in the early hours. The call from the hospital, unware of the connection.
Page 235, chapter 5
The hospital in the early hours. The operation on Baxter – with plenty of medical details. Back to bed with his wife, where we started. Close.
Page 281, end papers
A reproduction of Matthew Arnold’s poem of 1867, ‘Dover Beach’.
Credits and advertisements.
Reference 1: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/comte.html.
Reference 2: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/a-swing-through-fitzrovia.html.
Reference 3: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/goldberg.html.
Reference 4: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=franzen.
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