Ian McEwan

“No one now writing fiction in the English language surpasses Ian McEwan,” the Washington Post Book World proclaimed upon the publication of the author’s twelfth novel, Atonement, which shortly thereafter won the 2002 National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction. Dave Weich of Powells.com said, “To read McEwan’s work is to be swept away by prose of astonishing precision and power, and to be constantly surprised by the ambition and breadth of his scope.” Since his collection of stories, First Love, Last Rites, arrived to international acclaim in 1975 and won the Somerset Maugham Award in the process, the literary world has cleared room for each new release: in 1987 The Child in Time won the Whitbread Best Novel Award; in 1998 Amsterdam took home the Booker Prize. McEwan is a master at investigating human nature. His early work earned him the moniker “Ian the Macabre,” but his recent work has shifted to more introspective dramas. He claims the turning point in his writing was The Child in Time, “when political, moral, social, comic, and other possibilities moved in.” During his research for Saturday, a novel taking place over the course of twenty-four hours, he spent two years immersing himself in the world of a brain surgeon and observing surgeries. It also seems to be an interesting metaphor for a writer—the importance of thought and immersion in one’s work. Five of his novels have been adapted to films. Atonement received seven Academy Award nominations and won for Best Score; it also won Best Film of the Year at the British Academy of Film and Television Awards. McEwan has also written screenplays and an oratorio about nuclear war, and has recently collaborated with composer Charles Frieth on a libretto for the opera For You. At this event, McEwan will discuss the body of his work and will share insights about his novel-in-progress about climate change.

“One of the great pleasures of writing is not knowing where that story is taking you. You’re a character in it; you’re a character in the metafiction of What next?” —Ian McEwan