tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38548109.post2472424982325016590..comments2024-02-13T10:20:04.888+00:00Comments on David Hepworth's blog: Striving to better, oft we mar what’s wellDavid Hepworthhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05973053694541321308noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38548109.post-69526814519562932932008-02-28T23:06:00.000+00:002008-02-28T23:06:00.000+00:00At the risk of turning this into a private discuss...At the risk of turning this into a private discussion, I don't think you and I disagree all that much, Ken. I've heard the criticism before that McEwan writes brilliant scenes but unsatisfactory novels, and I can see some truth in it.<BR/><BR/>Is McEwan really that revered, anyway? I always think of him as just one of the coterie of middle-aged male novelists who started in the 80s and are still publishing readable novels - Barnes, Banks, Boyd, Swift, Faulks. Amis is the one who tends to be lionised.<BR/><BR/>To drag this back to the original question: David, as a Spurs fan, have you thought of giving 'Fever Pitch' the Nahum Tate treatment and changing the ending so that Arsenal don't win the League after all?TimThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14953081013855148796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38548109.post-26553540625527615762008-02-28T21:50:00.000+00:002008-02-28T21:50:00.000+00:00I hope that one day they uncover the alternative e...I hope that one day they uncover the alternative ending to The Winter's Tale: you know, one that doesn't include raising someone from the dead...Lucas Harehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09307807104038473162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38548109.post-37306607328382593392008-02-28T19:30:00.000+00:002008-02-28T19:30:00.000+00:00I’ve no problem with McEwan in small doses, Tim. T...I’ve no problem with McEwan in small doses, Tim. The early short stories a very good, if rather self-consciously lurid, and every novel has a few treats, often involving the description of an emotion which I had not only never seen written down before, but had never realised that anyone else experienced the same way. In The Innocent the scene where the man is hacked apart is deliciously gory but then the sex scene is embarrassingly bad. In Enduring Love the dope dealer is awful (and that’s before I get onto the baddie and painfully bad denouement of Saturday). <BR/>What I can’t see is why he is so revered when, so far as I can tell, he isn’t really up to the long haul of the novel. I hope it’s clear that I’m not putting him down without doing my homework – I’ve read every book he’s published. It just strikes me that the esteem with which he is regarded is as much proof as anyone could need that we are not living in a golden age of the British novel.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38548109.post-36447144686667803412008-02-28T17:22:00.000+00:002008-02-28T17:22:00.000+00:00Ken - I'm with you on Amis (a self-regarding show ...Ken - I'm with you on Amis (a self-regarding show pony who's never actually learnt the art of telling a story - quite important in a novelist, I find), but I can't agree about Ian McEwan.<BR/><BR/>While I wouldn't put him in the genius category, he's written some arresting, thought-provoking novels - The Innocent, The Child In Time and Enduring Love, for instance. And even his weaker novels usually contain at least one setpiece that sears itself into your memory - the account of the Dunkirk evacuation in Atonement is one that springs to mind.TimThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14953081013855148796noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38548109.post-27649829661369608822008-02-28T16:13:00.000+00:002008-02-28T16:13:00.000+00:00People wil be told that Ian McEwan and Martin Amis...People wil be told that Ian McEwan and Martin Amis were among the most highly regarded novelists of our age and laugh like the Smash potato alian robots.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38548109.post-89469858879288419292008-02-28T15:36:00.000+00:002008-02-28T15:36:00.000+00:00An interesting question and I guess it goes some w...An interesting question and I guess it goes some way to validating all those english lit lectures on postmodernism and the death of the author that we endured. Does this mean in 500 years time people might consider the Scissor Sisters version of Comfortably Numb to be the definitive version?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com