ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
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A great deal of didactic writing
JAN WOOLF reviews the latest title from the 'chronicler of muddle England'
Ian McEwan at Fronteiras do Pensamento (Frontiers of Thought), Porto Alegre October 2016
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
MICK McSHANE rubs shoulders with Mod legend Steve Craddock and joins in with the joyous Glasgow choir
DENNIS BROE sifts out the ideological bias of the newest TV series offerings, and picks out what to see, and what to avoid
Lessons
by Ian McEwan
Jonathan Cape £20
LESSONS is a long novel for Ian McEwan (now 74) and it’s interesting for fellow British boomers to join central character Roland Baines on his journey through postwar childhood, 1960s boarding school, relationships, parenthood, through to old age and Covid-19 — yet struggling to find a meaningful life (Roland, not the reader).
It is also a tale of sexual abuse and emotional abandonment. A sadistic, emotionally unstable piano teacher at Roland’s boarding school seduces him – later inviting him to her cottage nearby.
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