Amsterdam: A Novel
by Ian McEwan
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Book Summary Information
Author: Ian McEwanEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1999-11-02
ISBN: 0385494246
Number of pages: 208
Publisher: Anchor
Book Reviews of Amsterdam: A Novel
Book Review: Amsterdam
Summary: 3 Stars
Clive Linley and Vernon Halliday share a quiet moment of reflection at the funeral of their mutual lover, Molly Lane. They find her husband, George, distasteful, and regret that they were unable to see their once-lover and now friend during that hazy time between the onset of sickness and the final slump into death. Molly's passing was particularly extended and sad, due to an undisclosed illness that slowly ruptured her ability to speak, to move, to think, to remember.
At the funeral, we are given a cursory overview of the times when Clive and Vernon were Molly's lovers. McEwan relates their youth - for they are all now pushing fifty - with ease and skill, gracefully restoring the sixties and seventies just long enough for us to appreciate the character quirks of both Molly and the two friends, but not so long that we become bored.
George, Molly's husband, is introduced, then quickly shunted to the background where, the text persuades us, he belongs. 'George, the sad, rich publisher who doted on her and whom, to everyone's surprise, she had not left, though she always treated him badly. They looked now to where he stood outside the door, receiving commiseration from a group of mourners. Her death had raised him from general contempt.'
But it is Clive and Vernon whom we are to care about, over the course of the novel. While Molly is portrayed in flashbacks as vibrant, energetic, and sexual, she is not much more than a point from which the plot can launch. And it does, somewhat.
Clive is a composer, considered by his supporters as 'arch-conservative', by his detractors as a 'throwback'. He has been commissioned by the British Government to compose a symphony for the upcoming millennium, a task which is proving more a burden than a privilege. Clive is artistic without being an aesthete. He is a man of sensibilities and possesses a refined awareness of his own morality. He is more than capable of criticising Vernon for a decision that will prove ruinous and, possibly, fatal. Yet, when the challenge is made between art and morality, between completing the summation of his life's work and doing what is unarguably morally correct, Clive makes a choice for art that is completely within character, yet makes him a hypocrite when compared with his criticism of Vernon.
Vernon Halliday is the editor of an ailing newspaper, The Judge. The newspaper is controlled by an old guard of 'grammarians', who care more about dangling modifiers and subjugating verbs than producing stories that will sell. When Molly's husband George approaches Vernon with photos of a prominent politician in a compromising situation, he is faced with an ethical dilemma. Should he allow the newspaper to descend into the lowbrow chaos of gossip and scandal? Or should he continue with the current, failing ethos of the dying newspaper? Unhappily for us, the reader, Vernon has no issues with this question - he wants to publish the photos.
And therein lies the crux of the narrative. Vernon makes a decision that Clive finds reprehensible. Clive makes a decision that Vernon finds reprehensible. Two old friends, united in grief over the loss of a loved one, become implacable enemies. All of this is fine, with McEwan writing prose that is elegant, detailed and insightful. The inner workings of Clive's mind as he prepares his composition is particularly striking. 'An image came to him of a set of unfolding steps, sliding and descending - from the trap door of a loft, or from the door of a light plane. One note lay over and suggested the next. He heard it, he had it, then it was gone...This synaesthesia was a torment.'
But the novel stumbles in two areas, one of which is relatively minor but the second threatens to ruin the novel entirely. The first is Vernon's character. He is a fine creation, though I found him personally to be unappealing. If I were the head of a newspaper, I would not allow it to descend into sordid gossip pages and 'lifestyle' section of zero quality. However, I am not, and Vernon is. It is to McEwan's credit that Vernon is believable, even if he is distasteful. Clive is of course the complete opposite - he is the high-minded artist, the man for which all else but composition fades into the background. This first quibble is minor - it is personal. Others may find Vernon's character more appealing, and that is fine.
The second stumbling point is a mistake from which the novel cannot return. It deals specifically with the ending, which will not be spoiled. Suffice to say that the character arcs as they progress carry on just fine until the last twenty pages or so, when the characters travel to Amsterdam. And it is there where everything becomes untangled, and the reader is almost slapped in the face. While the events of the ending are heavily foreshadowed, and while there is a certain creative justice to what occurs, it is emotionally unsatisfying and entirely too literary. We cannot believe this ending in the real world - no matter how neatly everything fits together, the requirement for suspension of disbelief is too high. But not only that, it makes the wonderful prose, the accurate and realistic characters, and the building narrative tension of the first 150 pages of the novel, completely worthless. Surely there could have been a better way to complete Amsterdam.
But this review should not end on such a low note. McEwan is a wonderful writer, his prose is elegant, clever and honest, and his characters, for the most part, are superb. There is a heavy plot-point that I have not yet discussed, which deals with the politician and his photographs. This is handled well, and has strong resonances with the political climate of today. What politician does not live in fear of his private secrets coming to light in the sensationalist pages of the daily rag? A clean-handed politician, which is to say, very few of them. McEwan's take on this aspect of our interaction with the people who make our laws and govern in our name, is handled well, with a surprising outcome that is more honest in its unconventional turn.
Amsterdam is an uneasy recommendation. The novel is very good, but it is almost worth reading up until page 150, then abandoned. The ending destroys a creation of such promise, such skill, such sheer artistic delight. A shame.
Summary of Amsterdam: A Novel
On a chilly February day, two old friends meet in the throng outside a London crematorium to pay their last respects to Molly Lane. Both Clive Linley and Vernon Halliday had been Molly's lovers in the days before they reached their current eminence: Clive is Britain's most successful modern composer, and Vernon is editor of the newspaper The Judge. Gorgeous, feisty Molly had other lovers, too, notably Julian Garmony, Foreign Secretary, a notorious right-winger tipped to be the next prime minister.In the days that follow Molly's funeral, Clive and Vernon will make a pact with consequences that neither could have foreseen. Each will make a disastrous moral decision, their friendship will be tested to its limits, and Julian Garmony will be fighting for his political life. A sharp contemporary morality tale, cleverly disguised as a comic novel, Amsterdam is "as sheerly enjoyable a book as one is likely to pick up this year" (The Washington Post Book World).
When good-time, fortysomething Molly Lane dies of an unspecified degenerative illness, her many friends and numerous lovers are led to think about their own mortality. Vernon Halliday, editor of the upmarket newspaper the Judge, persuades his old friend Clive Linley, a self-indulgent composer of some reputation, to enter into a euthanasia pact with him. Should either of them be stricken with such an illness, the other will bring about his death. From this point onward we are in little doubt as to Amsterdam's outcome--it's only a matter of who will kill whom. In the meantime, compromising photographs of Molly's most distinguished lover, foreign secretary Julian Garmony, have found their way into the hands of the press, and as rumors circulate he teeters on the edge of disgrace. However, this is McEwan, so it is no surprise to find that the rather unsavory Garmony comes out on top. Ian McEwan is master of the writer's craft, and while this is the sort of novel that wins prizes, his characters remain curiously soulless amidst the twists and turns of plot. --Lisa Jardine
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