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Saturday

3.56 of 5 stars 3.56 · rating details · 28,024 ratings · 2,392 reviews

"Saturday, February 15, 2003. Henry Perowne is a contented man, a successful neurosurgeon, the devoted husband of Rosalind and the proud father of two grown-up children, one a promising poet, the other a talented blues musician. Unusually, he wakes before dawn, drawn to the window of his bedroom and filled with a growing unease. What troubles him as he looks out at the nig...more

Paperback, 289 pages

Published April 11th 2006 by Anchor (first published January 24th 2005)

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Aug 05, 2011 Shovelmonkey1 rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: people who are prepared to suspend their disbelief about how talented and successful everyone is

Recommended to Shovelmonkey1 by: 1001 books list

Shelves: 1001-books, bookcrossing-books, read-in-2011

Hello everybody,
I'm Henry Perowne and welcome to a day in my life... a Saturday to be precise. I'm a good natured sort of chap, if I were famous I'd probably be saddled with the tag of "thinking women's crumpet", but personally I take myself much to seriously to acknowledge that kind of thing. I'm a successful neurosurgeon who enjoys long, descriptive and adjective laden games of squash with my erudite and debonair colleagues. Today, for once in my incredibly lucky and wealthy life, I had a spot...more

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Sep 21, 2012 Jonathan rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 1001-books-to-read-before-you-die

Jonathan sits before his reliable laptop, gathering his thoughts on how to begin a review of Ian McEwan's Saturday. He has already made up his mind as to how he shall write this review, a mediocre attempt at emulating Mr McEwan's third-person, present-tense style, will suffice. Yet he struggles with the concept of how best to begin the review. Shall he mention the plot, the themes or the beautiful writing? He knows at this point that he will refer to why he talks as an omniscient narrator for th...more
Jonathan sits before his reliable laptop, gathering his thoughts on how to begin a review of Ian McEwan's Saturday. He has already made up his mind as to how he shall write this review, a mediocre attempt at emulating Mr McEwan's third-person, present-tense style, will suffice. Yet he struggles with the concept of how best to begin the review. Shall he mention the plot, the themes or the beautiful writing? He knows at this point that he will refer to why he talks as an omniscient narrator for this review yet he lacks words and ideas to allow him to begin. His fingers hover over the keyboard, waiting for inspiration in order to begin a review different from others previously attempted.

It comes to him now, he will open with a tale of how he came to be reading Saturday. He smiles wryly, the smile sliding to the very corners of his mouth. He certainly had never planned to read the novel. He had not set a reservation for the novel nor had he picked up from the shelf Saturday with the intention of reading it. He had believed the plain covered book to be a version of Ted Hughes' Birthday Letters, compulsory reading for his literature course. It seems to him now so ironic that he could have grabbed Saturday without realising that it was not a poetry collection, although it talks enough about that subject. Jonathan remembers back as to how he decided, upon realising his mistake, to read the novel. He had always intended to read some of Ian McEwan's work, Atonement being a particular novel he had considered, and the fact that the book was on the 1001 books-to-read-before-you-die list (now 1200+ books) convinced him he should actually read it.

And so he had read the book and he had found it entertaining. The prose, he considers, had been particularly beautiful in its simplicity. Though there had been far too many medical terms dished out by the author as unconstrained information. "Here", McEwan had said, "have 'neurologist', 'aneurysm', 'dopamine' and 'biopsy' to keep you company, I don't care whether you understand or care about such terms." Jonathan certainly did understand those terms, yet he wonders whether the way they were flung about would detract other thoughtful readers. Then there was also the matter as to whether other readers would care enough about a novel set on one single day. Would readers want to know about one man's solitary day left separated from the context of a single lifetime? Would other readers care enough about the prose and the entertaining aspects of the novel - would they care about neurosurgeon Henry Perowne and his family, his squash game, his home invasion?

Then, Jonathan questions, would they notice the themes of the novel? The ideas about how languages connect people. The suggestion that poetry could shape the lives about others and as an afterthought the connection between language and music through poetry. Would they see an idea about how our past deeds may come back to haunt us and how it is therefore important to question and challenge what we are doing in the moment? And would they see the idea of how a single day may be both everything and nothing in an individual's lifetime?

Jonathan stares at his laptop and then begins to write. He writes until he has completed his review. He writes until his thoughts are spread out before him like blood pouring from a wound. He looks then at what he has written and asks himself one more question. Have I informed everyone enough about what I think about this novel - that I like it and yet do not consider it a masterpiece - in order to make others consider at least reading this? He pauses for a moment, then he lets out a sigh. He has written a decent review he considers, let potential readers make the decision as to whether they will read this literary text. He scans his work once more and then directs his cursor to the single 'save' button.(less)

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Sep 19, 2012 Paul rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: novels

*******Note : SPOILERS ALL OVER THE PLACE!! This review is for people who have read Saturday or people who will never read Saturday!********

Reading Saturday is like running a weird obstacle race. At first it’s all manicured lawns and rhododendrons, and then it’s hideous piles of donkey droppings, and that’s how it goes – daffodils, donkey droppings, vistas of beauty, donkey droppings. And I’m not sure that was the intended effect. What a weird novel – here we have one of the stupidest plot devic...more

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Nov 14, 2007 John Brooks rated it 4 of 5 stars

I would not qualify "Saturday" as McEwan's best work. I think the argument begins and ends with "Atonement" in terms of sheer literary achievement.

But "Saturday" is McEwan's most immediate work; the one that feels most like a significant and honest byproduct of both the time and place from which it emerged and the man from whose mind materialized. To be clear, I adore "Atonement" and, for all its heart-wrenching and visceral exploration of obsession and paranoia, I love "Enduring Love".

"Saturda...more I would not qualify "Saturday" as McEwan's best work. I think the argument begins and ends with "Atonement" in terms of sheer literary achievement.

But "Saturday" is McEwan's most immediate work; the one that feels most like a significant and honest byproduct of both the time and place from which it emerged and the man from whose mind materialized. To be clear, I adore "Atonement" and, for all its heart-wrenching and visceral exploration of obsession and paranoia, I love "Enduring Love".

"Saturday" is an oddity because, by placing itself in the middle of one man's life, in the middle of his family, and in the middle of the most significant period of our time (that span between September 11th, 2001, and the advent of the Iraq war), it somehow manages to be about everything, the way that our own lives are *about* everything.

It is about love, family, aging, neurosurgery, home, poetry, literature, sex, violence, identity, war, fear, paranoia, despair, hope; virtually nothing is untouched, and the whole thing occurs in one day, as Henry Perowne, the flawed but amiable protagonist, recounts the minutes of this one day. This can be as banal as it sounds, and more often it is moving, even reviting, to live in someone else's mind, to have access to the ups and downs and even the dull moments, for just one day.

The Saturday in question is the one during the largest protest in human history, the London protest against the Iraq invasion, took place, and so it was never meant to be an ordinary Saturday for Henry. McEwan, true to form, makes ample use of metaphor and symbolism, reducing enormous global fluxes to personal experience. In the hands of most writers, such tactics would be cheap and cliche, but McEwan, one of the most gifted living writers of fiction, knows that he has bought the right to employ such tactics.

Because the point, ultimately, of "Saturday" is, quite beautifully, that those events that affect the whole world tend to affect each and every one of its inhabitants individually. So as the Perowne family suffers their own personal nightmare, together, as a family, it suddenly becomes simultaneously a much more *and* much less personal experience. It is as shared and universal as it is deeply disturbing and private. It is the bizarre paradox we face in this shrinking world of ours; nobody truly lives and experiences anything in isolation. It is a strange new world, but McEwan somehow reminds us how essentially similar massive, destructive global shifts are to all the trials and hardships we have always faced in our own tiny lives. It's a short, beautiful, and effective story about who we were then, where we are now, how all that changed, and how, in the end, things tend to remain defiantly the same.(less)

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Aug 21, 2011 Manny rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: too-sexy-for-maiden-aunts

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Warning: also contains major spoilers for Night Train

Many of the other reviewers say they're annoyed with Saturday on the grounds that the main character's life is too implausibly perfect - a successful neurosurgeon with a beautiful wife, two talented children, a lovely home, etc etc. He's even a pretty decent squash player. So how can Henry possibly fill the Everyman role he's apparently meant to inhabit?

Well, it seems to me that McEwan is making a sensible point here. Compared to most people...more Warning: also contains major spoilers for Night Train

Many of the other reviewers say they're annoyed with Saturday on the grounds that the main character's life is too implausibly perfect - a successful neurosurgeon with a beautiful wife, two talented children, a lovely home, etc etc. He's even a pretty decent squash player. So how can Henry possibly fill the Everyman role he's apparently meant to inhabit?

Well, it seems to me that McEwan is making a sensible point here. Compared to most people in human history, and indeed to most people in the world today, your average educated Westerner (e.g. your average person who posts on Goodreads) is unbelievably privileged. Of course, most of us aren't quite as privileged as Henry, but, when you compare against the great mass of humanity, the difference is so small that it's close to technical. So, the natural question that arises is: how are we making use of our incredible good fortune?

It occurred to me that Saturday is in some ways a mirror-image of Martin Amis's Night Train, another novel that people often slam. In the Amis book, we also have an extraordinarily fortunate character. Jennifier is young, beautiful, greatly loved and, on top of everything else, a cutting-edge research astrophysicist. (Amis is a big fan of astrophysics). And what does she do with all of this amazing luck? At the end, it turns out that she's killed herself for no reason at all! Given Amis's general preoccupation with our society's self-destructive trajectory, I think the intended message is clear. We are Jennifer: we could have a paradise if we were just the tiniest bit sensible, but instead we're destroying ourselves and the whole world for no reason.

In Saturday, I felt that the set-up was basically the same, but the final message was positive. Some parts of the story are indeed implausible (you are unlikely to deter a psychotic rapist by reciting Dover Beach). All the same, I liked the ending, where, almost without thinking, Henry uses his surgeon's skills to save the life of the man who, a few hours ago, was trying to kill him. This is right; this is how one should show appreciation for the gifts that fortune has showered on us.

I know, I know. Moral parables are unfashionable at the moment, and elegant despair is the cool choice. I still thought McEwan was saying something worthwhile here.
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Aug 07, 2008 Rose rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: doctors, determinists, naturalists, those interested in the human brain

Shelves: 1001-books, read-in-2008

No spoilers here.

This book explores the events of Henry Perowne's Saturday, which I can kind of see as a metaphor for a person's life. You start out with nothing but potential, events happen, and each day ends with its own sort of oblivion - sleep.

As with Atonement, McEwan's prose in this book was simply delicious. At the end of this review are some of my favorite passages that I just needed to type out for my own memory's sake.

But I also think that reading Atonement first spoiled me. I was ex...more No spoilers here.

This book explores the events of Henry Perowne's Saturday, which I can kind of see as a metaphor for a person's life. You start out with nothing but potential, events happen, and each day ends with its own sort of oblivion - sleep.

As with Atonement, McEwan's prose in this book was simply delicious. At the end of this review are some of my favorite passages that I just needed to type out for my own memory's sake.

But I also think that reading Atonement first spoiled me. I was expecting this book to wallop me just like that novel had, but it didn't pack quite the same punch. While the narration of the everyday stuff was engrossing, the narration of the actual plot points was unbelievable. And, btw, the plot points are few and far between. Also, another reviewer of this book made a point that the character of Henry Perowne had a little too much going for him. His wife was beautiful, his daughter was beautiful, his son was talented, and he was a great surgeon. It gets a little boring. And don't get me started on how annoying it gets to constantly hear that female characters are "beautiful." This has become a pet peeve of mine, but should probably be the subject of a livejournal entry or something.

Forgetting that, the book was still good. It's amazing how well McEwan can explore the themes he picks. And after reading this and Atonement, it's hard to miss what a staunch materialist McEwan is (the scientific, deterministic sort of materialist - not the kind that likes to buy stuff). Events and catalysts are all causes and effects of other things. Moods, interactions, fights from decades past, car accidents - they are all the cause of hormones, or neurons, or world leaders' actions thousands of miles away. It's impossible to chronicle every action and re-action, but McEwan artfully shows us how deterministic this world is and what we can attempt to do in our slide toward oblivion.

A couple favorite passages below demonstrate this materialism.

1.) [at a fish market] "Henry liked to put to himself when he was a schoolboy: what are the chances of this particular fish, from that shoal, off that continental shelf, ending up in the pages, no, on this page of this copy of the Daily Mirror? Something just short of infinity to one. Similarly, the grains of sand on a beach, arranged just so. The random ordering of the world, the unimaginable odds against any particular condition still please him. Even as a child, and especially after Aberfan, he never believed in fate or providence, or the future being made by someone in the sky. Instead, at every instant, a trillion trillion possible futures; the pickiness of pure chance and physical laws seemed like freedom from the scheming of a gloomy god" (pages 128-129).

2. [while pondering the workings of the human brain] "For all the recent advances, it's still not known how this well-protected one kilogram or so of cells actually encodes information, how it holds experiences, memories, dreams and intentions. He doesn't doubt that in years to come, the coding mechanism will be known... But even when it [is], the wonder will remain that mere wet stuff can make this bright inward cinema of thought, of sight and sound and touch bound into a vivid illusion of an instantaneous present, with a self, another brightly wrought illusion, hovering like a ghost at its centre. Could it ever be explained, how matter becomes conscious?" (page 262)

3. There are a few interesting thoughts developed from his trip to the nursing home to visit his mother, who is suffering from dementia. She is fixated fondly on her deceased mother: "How strange it would have been for Lily's mother, an aloof, unmaternal woman, to have known that the little girl at her skirts would one day, in a remote future, a science fiction date in the next century, talk of her all the time and long to be home with her. Would that have softened her? (page 168) There was also an amusing observation by the main character that the mundane happenings of his day would be considered extremely exciting to his nursing home-bound mother.

Okay, that's enough for now, but it's a beautiful and quick read, and I can see how this could spark a lot of discussion, so I'd recommend it. I'd especially recommend it to stone cold naturalists, of which I am one!(less)

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Dec 06, 2007 Elizabeth rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a "day in the life" kind of novel: the story of a single Saturday in the life of Henry Perowne, a middle-aged London neurosurgeon. The day is both ordinary and extraordinary; we get a lot of rather mundane detail about Henry, his family, and his life. Yet the day is significant, not only because of the explosive encounter between Henry and a complete stranger, but because it's set in February 2003, on the day of a massive anti-war protest. The impending Iraq war is thus a subject of much...more

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Sep 13, 2007 Lori rated it 1 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people who have trouble falling alseep

Shelves: fiction

Ok. I usually force myself to finish each novel I start. (with the two exceptions so far being Catch 22 and Atlas Shrugged).. I do this (1) to at least get my moneys worth, and (2) because I know somewhere in there, there must be a part worth waiting for.

This book fell into the (2) catagory. It was an impossible bore throughout most of the novel, with one interesting fight in an alley due to a fender bender.... until you hit the last 50 pages. For me, hitting those last chapters was like breaki...more

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Apr 28, 2008 Marigold rated it 4 of 5 stars

I loved this book! This is not a book for you if you’re looking for entertainment only, or light reading. This is a book full of layers, metaphors, parallels, & issues to think about. The thing that most reached out & grabbed me was the idea of a man going about his daily life (whether you find his daily life mundane or overly privileged or whatever), when unexpected events occur & change everything. That’s always sort of a scary theme for me! On the surface it’s the story of Henry,...more I loved this book! This is not a book for you if you’re looking for entertainment only, or light reading. This is a book full of layers, metaphors, parallels, & issues to think about. The thing that most reached out & grabbed me was the idea of a man going about his daily life (whether you find his daily life mundane or overly privileged or whatever), when unexpected events occur & change everything. That’s always sort of a scary theme for me! On the surface it’s the story of Henry, a successful London neurosurgeon; his wife Rosalind, a lawyer; their daughter, a soon to be published poet living in Paris; & their son, a blues musician, also on the brink of success. It’s a story that takes place over the course of one day – Feb 15, 2003, a day just before the start of the Iraq war, when there were huge anti-war demonstrations in London & around the world. That morning, Henry wakes up in the early morning hours & goes to look out the window. He sees an airplane headed toward Heathrow airport, & it appears to be in trouble. This encounter with disaster & possible terrorism informs & affects the rest of Henry’s Saturday. On this day, he’s planned a series of ordinary activities – a game of squash with a coworker; groceries; dinner, etc. Unfortunately, a minor traffic accident interrupts his plans, & brings his life into collision with Baxter, a – what? – small-time crook? – McEwan never specifically tells us – but we know Baxter has some sidekicks who don’t hesitate to use violence. Henry sees that Baxter has neurological symptoms that he’s able to instantly diagnose as a debilitating & fatal genetic disease.
All of that is the surface story. Along the way, you get to learn about neurosurgery – fascinating! I thought the detail about this was really interesting, tho have seen a lot of criticism about its inclusion. Really? Roll with it, you might learn something! You get to learn about the game of squash, literature, poetry, genetic diseases, the aging process, music, & cooking – all parts of Henry’s day or his thinking about his day. You get to think about war & peace & terrorism & fear & politics - & how these huge issues affect all of us even as we cope with the details of our lives. (Maybe you don’t want to think about these things – in which case, don’t read this book!)
Themes to find: The need for control in our lives, what things we have control over, what we don’t, & what happens when unexpected events make us doubt our control. The fear of lack of control or losing control. Work – competitiveness – how it affects our relationships. Biological determinism – to what extent is our destiny controlled by our genes? Violence, war, & what forces are available to us to counteract violence. Seems like a lot of people were disturbed by Henry’s family being “too perfect.” Legitimate – but here’s a theme to look for – the four disciplines of medicine, law, literature & music - & how they stack up against forces of chaos & violence. There’s a whole idea to think about that has to do with Henry & how the different parts of his personality work for or against him in the particular struggle he faces on this Saturday – or do his children represent different parts of him? Or parts of a greater whole that he needs to integrate? And who is Baxter, really? Maybe he’s part of Henry too – in a sense (read the end!) – or part of that greater whole. What does his reaction to the poem that Daisy recites, mean to the story? Another theme – creativity - & what would it mean to a dying man, to have the ability to create something like a poem, that has a life of its own, & an ability to inspire particular feelings & longings in others? I could go on but this is much too long! I thought “Saturday” was FASCINATING.
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May 13, 2009 Siobhan added it

Shelves: bad-books

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I thoroughly disliked this book. It's the only Ian McEwan book I've read and if this is typical of him, I'm not going back for me.

Each character, and each event, seems to have a massive backstory to get through before we can get back to the present moment. That got tedious fast.

As for the characters, with their perfect lives in a toney London neighborhood, they're not particularly interesting. The bad guys who do show up and give the book a little texture are caricatures and really not worth c...more

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Dec 11, 2008 Bonnie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed-books, recommended

Enjoyed this much more than Atonement!

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Jan 27, 2009 Lobstergirl rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: to-be-burned, fiction

Godawful.

"Saturday" was ponderous, labored, rhetorically thick and therefore perhaps to my mind pretentious, or do I mean pompous? It was like a big bloated beer gut, but a beer gut bloated - indeed, rendered distended, turgid, and tumescent - by the finest chardonnays, Gewurztraminers, and Sauvignon Blancs, sipped (quaffed?) while listening to Bach Partitas. It was bereft of conciseness, brevity, midgetude, terseness, laconism, abbreviation, and pith, its rather meaningless, hollow sentences cu...more

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Apr 03, 2008 Jim rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Someone who already likes McEwan. Someone new to the author should choose something else.

Shelves: this-sceptred-isle, fiction

I think McEwan took the approach James Joyce used in Ulysses, that is, to detail the events of a day, in a narrative driven by a character's thoughts. Ulysses is a stream-of-consciousness masterpiece, Saturday isn't in that league. (It's probably unfair to compare a novelist with James Joyce, but literary publicists do it all the time. McEwan has received plenty of positive comparisons with the likes of Dickens and Hardy, even Shakespeare.)

There is some beautiful writing here, and that kept me...more I think McEwan took the approach James Joyce used in Ulysses, that is, to detail the events of a day, in a narrative driven by a character's thoughts. Ulysses is a stream-of-consciousness masterpiece, Saturday isn't in that league. (It's probably unfair to compare a novelist with James Joyce, but literary publicists do it all the time. McEwan has received plenty of positive comparisons with the likes of Dickens and Hardy, even Shakespeare.)

There is some beautiful writing here, and that kept me going. Still, I kept asking myself whether something, anything, was going to happen. Occasionally plot breaks through, specifically the protagonist Henry Perowne's confrontation with some thugs over a minor traffic scrape. When McEwan allows plot to drive the narrative, it's superb. McEwan also writes convincingly about the personal lives of his characters and the relations between them. He captures the complicated tangle of emotions we have for the people we love. For this, for style, for his portrayal of confrontation, this should get 4 stars.

Unfortunately, this book is not defined by its good bits. Admittedly the novel didn't quite match its American promotion, which tended to stress the backdrop of the post-9/11 world and the run-up to the war in Iraq. McEwan certainly uses these themes; at times they are prominent, but I didn't feel it was integral to the story. It was a subject that inspired characters' thoughts and conversations, but I didn't get the sense it was anything like the zeitgeist of the novel's world. [I'm waiting for that book, not a book about 9/11, but rather about how people live their lives in this awful new world in which we find ourselves. (I thought Jonathan Coe did a decent job of this in Closed Circle. I would like to see how someone like Nick Hornby might handle this.)]

The biggest problem I had with the book, the one that really kept me from enjoying it, was that too much time was spent focused on what Henry himself refers to as the 'white noise' of his thoughts. If the character were a real person, he would be admirable, a gifted neurosurgeon, a loving husband and father, a decent cook. The problem is that he's a bit dull.

In Ulysses, Joyce used multiple interior voices and packed in so much detail that there's always something to look at. Also, Joyce's Dublin is seen from the pavement; as pedestrians we have time to take in more. What we see of London through Henry Perowne's eyes is from his car. Mostly we're stuck in traffic. When Henry gets out of his car, he spends a lot of time thinking about his squash game or recalling time spent operating on brains. Interesting, maybe, but not sufficient to drive a novel forward.

All in all, sometimes pleasant, often frustrating, ultimately disappointing.
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Mar 04, 2008 Howard rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-i-reviewed-for-kirkus

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. An increasingly mellowed but no less gripping McEwan vividly portrays the thoughts and experience of a single day in the life of an upper-middle class Londoner, blessed in every conceivable way.

While crowds mass in London to protest the coming invasion of Iraq in February of 2003, Henry Perowne, a 48-year-old neurosurgeon at the top of his game, intelligent and self-aware, goes about his particular Saturday, by turns mundane and marvelous. We follow his reflections on surgeries so well detailed...more An increasingly mellowed but no less gripping McEwan vividly portrays the thoughts and experience of a single day in the life of an upper-middle class Londoner, blessed in every conceivable way.

While crowds mass in London to protest the coming invasion of Iraq in February of 2003, Henry Perowne, a 48-year-old neurosurgeon at the top of his game, intelligent and self-aware, goes about his particular Saturday, by turns mundane and marvelous. We follow his reflections on surgeries so well detailed as to be med-porn; lazy lovemaking upon awakening and restorative sex at the end of the day with smart, devoted, lawyer wife, Rosalind, (he notes his unusual luck that he still wants no one else); a sometimes savage squash game with friend and partner Jay; a sad visit to his senile mother; and shopping for dinner. A chance encounter with Baxter, an intelligent young thug, provides the small plot; Henry escapes a mugging when he recognizes early signs of Huntington’s in the lad and takes control. That evening, at Henry’s well-appointed townhouse, in the warm glow of gathering family--father-in-law John Grammaticus, towering poet turned to drink; son Theo, a gifted young blues guitarist; daughter Daisy, visiting from Paris, a poet both newly published and newly pregnant--Baxter returns, holding Rosalind at knifepoint. While terrorized and terrified, the family through their various strengths overcome Baxter, who lands in the hospital, requiring emergency surgery from the forgiving Henry. Taken up with an active awareness of his place in the world, his love for his family and work, the contingencies that make his life his, and Baxter’s Baxter’s, and informed by a matter-of-fact understanding of the neurological processes that emerge as behavior and look like choice, Henry’s thoughts envelop us in a total immersion experience.

A sort of middle-class humanist manifesto: When you find yourself fortunate beyond all measure in a random universe, gratitude, generosity and compassion are a decent response.(less)

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Oct 19, 2010 Maciek rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: owned-books, crap, own-in-paperback, read-in-2010, reviewed, booker-long-and-shortlist

Short version: GOD IT WAS BORING.

Long version: You know the anecdote that a succesful novelist could publish his shopping list and people would buy it? That's the case with Saturday. A chronicle of 24 hours from the life of neurosurgeon Henry Perowne, the novel is full of his ruminations, reminiscences, all described in painful, tedious detail. McEwan fails to build an actual plot; instead you'll be sure to hear every single event, no matter how irrelevant and drawn out (there's an 18 page descr...more

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Oct 14, 2009 Esteban del Mal rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, novel

"...it interests him less to have the world reinvented; he wants it explained."

Literature still has something to say to science.

Against the backdrop of the pending invasion of Iraq, a very rational and orderly neurosurgeon is menaced by a very irrational hooligan. Poetry comes to the rescue.

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Sep 20, 2012 agent zero rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: anglofoni

McEwan è bravo, scrive bene. Anche l'idea è interessante, seppur non originalissima.
Non gli do cinque stelline solo perché... non saprei, ma mi sembra uno scrittore poco pirotecnico per i miei gusti, troppo ordinario. O forse è semplicemente che ho letto McEwan subito dopo Auster.

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Nov 16, 2010 Amanda Patterson rated it 1 of 5 stars

I took this book out of desperation. There seems to be so little good fiction out there at the moment. I wish I hadn’t. I began to hope that Saturday would become Sunday very quickly as I started to read.

I think McEwan gets by on his literary accolades alone. Apparently he won the Booker Prize for Amsterdam in 1998. He has also written 8 other novels. I would dare another publisher to take him on under a pseudonym – and to succeed.

McEwan, as always, dwells on the damage and darkness of life. He...more

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May 24, 2010 Julie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: own, fiction

This is the most introspective of McEwan's novels. It's a 24-hour period in the life of neurosurgeon Henry Perowne. What sets out to be a sleepy Saturday full of errands (a squash game, a trip to the grocer, a visit with his mother) turns into the inner dialogue of a man coping with unsettling turns of events.

This is definitely a post-Nine Eleven narrative, comprised of Henry's thoughts about the political climate and observations of the anti-war rallies taking place. Other underlying themes in...more

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Dec 22, 2008 Reid rated it 5 of 5 stars

Atonement was a great novel, a pretty good movie as well. But Saturday is tighter, a more personal novel, more focused and perhaps more human. I originally got interested in this book as it was compared to Proust and I wanted to get the gist without slogging through thousands of pages to get that done. The action is almost entirely in Perowne's head, which really gave me a glimpse into McEwan himself. I suppose I think it's impossible to get outside one's own thoughts, I think that might be part...more

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Jun 12, 2008 Nikki rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: contemporary

Like my (upcoming) review of Perdido Street Station, this was written as I went along. My mum told me to read this book just so that I've read something of McEwan's work, to get an idea of the East Anglia style -- I was once planning to do the same writing course.

The first ten pages bored me. Blah, blah, blah, mostly medical procedure, a doctor's life is so busy, blahblahblah -- a scenario I know well as a doctor's daughter, that doesn't really seem to merit ten pages to me. It got old fast in r...more Like my (upcoming) review of Perdido Street Station, this was written as I went along. My mum told me to read this book just so that I've read something of McEwan's work, to get an idea of the East Anglia style -- I was once planning to do the same writing course.

The first ten pages bored me. Blah, blah, blah, mostly medical procedure, a doctor's life is so busy, blahblahblah -- a scenario I know well as a doctor's daughter, that doesn't really seem to merit ten pages to me. It got old fast in real life; in print, it's even worse. The prose is quite ordinary, and lingers on topics I don't find particularly interesting: pages on pages about medical techniques, a couple of pages about the main character's son's music, a paragraph about the advances in kettles, pages in which the main character denounces the value of stories, half a chapter devoted to a squash game I couldn't care less about...

Despite that, there's something about it that kept me reading. Something vaguely hypnotic. I didn't find it "dazzling... profound and urgent" as the cover promised. I found it dry, plodding, boring, stolid. By seventy-eight pages in, the guy hasn't left his home yet and the most exciting thing is the plane in flames, which is dismissed in about two pages, near the beginning.

Strangely enough, I thought it did pick up near the end. Most of the drama was anti-climatic and sandwiched between pages and pages of irrelevant detail, but I tried to read it with the view that the book is meant to be about an ordinary guy going about his ordinary life. The prose mimics that, and the pages and pages of description enforce it. It took me ages to decide how many stars to give it. I'm not sure there was much to really like or dislike. The idea could have been interesting, but I'm not sure there's realistically a way to write about an ordinary man going through his mostly ordinary day in a way that keeps someone genuinely interested throughout. The build up was needed so you could care enough about the characters, but all the build up made me bored with them. I definitely don't think this is a "modern classic" or whatever. I don't think it has the strength to last.

I might try something else of this guy's, to see if I like him better when he's not restricting himself to one day of an ordinary guy's life. Any recommendations?(less)

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Hollis 'Any others you know of that are of the U. East Anglia style?'

Toby Litt is, although he isn't that famous at the moment. Well, I think the East Anglia...more
Mar 16, 2010 07:19am

Nikki My mother is a doctor, actually. If I remember rightly, she knew the guy whose life this book is based on, albeit not well. I don't recall whether it...more
updated Mar 17, 2010 09:28am

Feb 23, 2008 Beth rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: If you are a deeper thinker than I, maybe you can explain it to me.

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Feb 10, 2008 Anuar Kassim rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Well, it's either "Saturday" or "Atonement". I opted for Saturday to see how this book goes as the blurp sounds interesting.

The story surrounds Henry Perowne, a successful neurosurgeon. On a Saturday, when London is preparing for an anti-war demonstration (Iraq War), Henry on his way to his weekly squash game was delayed not only by the demonstration but by an accident with some thugs, one of them having an ailment that Henry seems to have diagnosed. Fortunately, Henry was able to wiggle his wa...more Well, it's either "Saturday" or "Atonement". I opted for Saturday to see how this book goes as the blurp sounds interesting.

The story surrounds Henry Perowne, a successful neurosurgeon. On a Saturday, when London is preparing for an anti-war demonstration (Iraq War), Henry on his way to his weekly squash game was delayed not only by the demonstration but by an accident with some thugs, one of them having an ailment that Henry seems to have diagnosed. Fortunately, Henry was able to wiggle his way out of the incident, although shakened was able to continue with his planned activities for the day.

Well, most part of this novel centers around Henry's list of ordinary activities that he did on that day, what thoughts that went through his head, his flashbacks, among many others. I particularly like the discussion regarding the war especially his debate with his daughter, Daisy. I remembered how some of us (colleagues and family members) actually had the same kind of discussion on whether the war was justified or not and that Saddam needed to be disposed of or not. As in the novel, the discussions did become quite heated up. I also appreciate Henry's meeting with his mother at the home, who is suffering from dementia due to old age, as I reflect upon my own parents and myself on what happens if I were to grow old in future. The concern is that, for my case, who would be looking after me if this does happen as the likelihood of marriage is slim at this point of time.

I find the novel rather boring (in a way) saved only by the brief excitement that was brought into Henry's home when the thug Baxter, somehow managed to find his way to Henry's neighbourhood and intruded with an accomplice into his home at knife point. Somehow, McEwan's mundane and routine portrayal of Henry's acts through the day seems to lull the reader until at that precise moment of intrusion when the reader's adrenaline starts to run high. This however, was brief. Nevertheless, somehow, the book gets you thinking that there are thugs everywhere, at the world stage as well as at your own doorstep, so beware of the supposed tranquility.

Is this book a let down? In terms of exciting possibilities, yes but in terms of trying to see a bigger picture (whatever that you may want it to be), no, I guess. Personally like I said, the book is rather boring. Perhaps, I should have started with "Atonement" first as my friend had earlier suggested. An exerpt (pg. 66, this edition) that struck me would be Henry's thought on reading "...Nor does he really want to be a spectator of other lives, of imaginary lives,...Why make things up?" Hahahaha....(less)

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Dec 02, 2007 Lain rated it 5 of 5 stars

Rare is the author who can write a compelling story in clear prose. Rarer still is the author who can create fine and distinct layers of meaning while maintaining that clear narrative. Ian McEwan is one of those authors.

In the tradition of "Mrs. Dalloway," "Saturday" traces the ordinary activities of an ordinary man, neurologist Henry Preowne. Against the backdrop of a huge anti-war march in London, Henry goes about his daily activities -- a squash game, checking in on his patients at the hospi...more

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Dec 15, 2007 Jonathan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

SPOILER ALERT

Something about this beautifully written book really spoke to me. The book's protagonist, British neurosurgeon Henry Perowne, is like many of us in the months after the Sept. 11 attacks in sensing that his life, even if personally untouched by terrorism, would never be the same again. As his nation prepares to go to war in Iraq, Henry can't escape the feeling that our already limited ability as humans to control our own destinies has been diminished. (A sentiment that McEwan conveys...more

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Dec 28, 2007 Naomi rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: расслабления

Saturday sets out to overcome the banal fact that the details of every individual's daily work, the minutiae of their job, are virtually impenetrable to anyone else - spouse, child, best-friend or co-worker. Still more difficult to convey is the interior monologue that goes with work, the thoughts and emotions that are never expressed. In an interesting bid to overcome this incommunicability McEwan lays out before us a day in Henry's life. There is certainly an imaginative spark in the impulse,...more

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Feb 08, 2007 Keith Mukai rated it 3 of 5 stars

McEwan was lauded for supposedly having his finger on the pulse of the post-9/11 nation with Saturday. Note my use of the word "supposedly."

It's a day-in-the-life story where that day happens to be post-9/11 (I think a few years removed, so it's not like this is a day-after story). Right from the start he watches a plane land that looks like it's on fire and obviously that will call up some bad memories. But the story's association with the post-9/11 world is very tangential. It exists within it...more

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Apr 29, 2008 Avital rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: english

This book seems more realistic than most fiction books, since it enters into an abundance of every-day details. One Saturday in the life of a neurosurgeon, the main character, is not only full of potentially disastrous happenings, but it also spreads toward the past and the future through memories and plans. Dr. Perowne makes many observations about politics, war and illness. He doesn’t commit himself to a strong opinion, since he sees various facets in every issue, including the war in Iraq. I...more

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Jul 21, 2008 Alan rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: novels, disappointments

as usual expertly written - so why 2 stars? Because it is stupidly unbelievable - the hero is not only a great brain surgeon but an excellent squash player and a good cook, with a beautiful wife who loves him, a son who is a marvellous bass player (tutored by Jack Bruce!), and a daughter who is not only a good poet (and just out of her teenage years), but an award winning one too. The parents too are distinguished. There are maybe families like this around but I've never met them or known anyone...more

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Garrie I agree with all of the above but despite that I liked it. In fact I was quite in awe at the end, maybe because it was so positive about humanity, or...more
Jun 25, 2012 05:08am

Alan It's me Garrie - I'm an old curmudgeon. This book ain't supposed to be realistic, the names give it away as you say. Many of my friends and GR critics...more
Jun 26, 2012 01:48am

Garrie I agree Alan and normally that would make me throw the book across the room. I think I just got swept along by the power of the writing, after all it'...more
Jun 26, 2012 02:06am

Dec 17, 2008 Annalisa rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: audiobook, literary

I'm bored; I'm done. I loved Atonement so much I had to check out whether or not any of McEwan's novels were as powerful. The thing is, the slow descriptive pace works for Atonement because of the subject matter. The over-examination had a purpose. But here we have the life of a middle-aged typically cocky doctor and we examine an entire day in his life. Some people's lives may be worth the slow pain-staking analysis, but his, I just don't care about. But that's not even why I quit. I got fed up...more

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About Ian McEwan

Ian McEwan was born on 21 June 1948 in Aldershot, England. He studied at the University of Sussex, where he received a BA degree in English Literature in 1970. He received his MA degree in English Literature at the University of East Anglia.

McEwan's works have earned him worldwide critical acclaim. He won the Somerset Maugham Award in 1976 for his first collection of short stories First Love, Last...more

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“You can tell a lot from a person's nails. When a life starts to unravel, they're among the first to go.” — 92 people liked it

“There's a taste in the air, sweet and vaguely antiseptic, that reminds him of his teenage years in these streets, and of a general state of longing, a hunger for life to begin that from this distance seems like happiness.” — 56 people liked it

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