Amsterdam

published	1999 by Anchor
first published	1998
binding	Paperback
isbn	0385494246 (isbn13: 9780385494243)
pages	208
literary awards	Booker Prize Winner 1998
description	When good-time, fortysomething Molly Lane dies of an unspecified degenerative illness, her many friends and numerous lovers are led to think about the...more [close] 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
date added	12-08-06 edit book

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Kelly rated it:

04/10/08

bookshelves: brit-lit, fiction

Read in April, 2008

I suppose my experience of reading this book can be best compared to hearing Beethoven's Eroica Symphony, then the Ninth Symphony, and then being played the Moonlight Sonata. It isn't that this book is any less deserving of praise than Atonement or Enduring Love (I shall leave it to you to figure out which one I classed as the Eroica and which one as the Ninth. :)), but I believe the purpose and the scale of those two books are on a completely different plane than Amsterdam, but intentionally so...more I suppose my experience of reading this book can be best compared to hearing Beethoven's Eroica Symphony, then the Ninth Symphony, and then being played the Moonlight Sonata. It isn't that this book is any less deserving of praise than Atonement or Enduring Love (I shall leave it to you to figure out which one I classed as the Eroica and which one as the Ninth. :)), but I believe the purpose and the scale of those two books are on a completely different plane than Amsterdam, but intentionally so.

Both the plot and the scope of Amsterdam are very tightly controlled, and clearly driven towards the point at the end. One could feel the prose moving you along McEwan's intended course towards the proper mood to find the end. This is not to say that the language isn't as important as his other novels. I think in fact that it is even more important here. Rather than the sometimes beautifully rambling tone of his other work that could take a bit of a scenic route to get towards its point, letting it creep up on you unawares, McEwan instead makes his piercingly described and chosen words serve a double purpose. This would make Amsterdam perhaps the most poetic of his novels in technique, considering how carefully every word seemed to be chosen.

McEwan still manages to deal with very big themes here. The basic plotline his patented single event with a moral problem and the various consequences for the people involved. In this case, it is the death of Molly Lane, a woman beloved of at least four of the men featured, and how their reactions to her death shape all of their lives. His standard dilemma of moral decisions gone wrong is present, of course. He writes about the meaning of friendship, how mere moods and selfishness change our entire worldview, love lost, the effect of one's death upon loved ones, and embodies three different kinds of need in the three major male characters in the novel. I won't elaborate too much but I think it is debatable which of these men feels love, which desire, which the need to be saved. Or if it is a combination of all three. He still manages to sneak in a bit of black comedy (for some reason all the reviews on the book seemed to focus on this one point. Perhaps because it is so unusual in a McEwan novel.) as these characters start to unravel over the course of the novel into a horrible, twisted joke upon themselves and the world. This book is heartbreaking, make no mistake, but in a quieter way. In an awful, unexpected way that is no less touching for the brevity of his treatment of it. In a way, I think it makes it more powerful that the book is so short. We miss so much, we are left to imagine and fill in the gaps.

I don't know if you've seen Casablanca, those reading this. But if you have... in some ways, I believe that this novel was McEwan's answer to Bogart's famous quote near the end of the movie when he's trying to make Ingrid Bergman leave with her husband: "I'm no good at being noble, but it doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world."

I think Amsterdam both tragically agrees with that and ironically, laughingly disagrees at the same time. This little short statement is by no means his grandest novel, either in tone or subject, but I do not think that detracts from its value. In any case- very much recommended. I would read Enduring Love or Atonement first so as to understand the scope of what the author is capable of, but then this, to show the lovely, little, other end of the spectrum. I think that this has value, too....less

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Steven rated it:

04/27/08

bookshelves: 1001

Read in April, 2008

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

The novel begins with the funeral of Molly Lane, who is described as being eccentric and quite beautiful. We meet the two main characters of the novel, Vernon Halliday, a newspaper editor, and Clive Linley, a very famous composer. Both men are apparently pretty good friends and enjoy the other’s company. We also meet another man, Julian Garmony, Foreign Secretary in what sounds like the Thatcher government. All three of these men have been lovers of Molly at some point and both Vernon and ...more The novel begins with the funeral of Molly Lane, who is described as being eccentric and quite beautiful. We meet the two main characters of the novel, Vernon Halliday, a newspaper editor, and Clive Linley, a very famous composer. Both men are apparently pretty good friends and enjoy the other’s company. We also meet another man, Julian Garmony, Foreign Secretary in what sounds like the Thatcher government. All three of these men have been lovers of Molly at some point and both Vernon and Clive regard Garmony with some degree of disgust and they wonder what the heck Milly saw in him. The funeral is organized by Molly’s late husband, George, who is presented as a bit of a chump by the other three men.

Clive and Vernon note that they definitely do not want to go out like Molly, who apparently suffered in her later months, and they make a pact to one another that they will make the end for the other more dignified than the way Molly went out.
Clive Linley struggles throughout the novel in working on a very important symphony, billed as the Milennium Symphony. Unfortunately, he just can’t seem to get the melody completely right and he decides to go on vacation hiking in the Lake District for inspiration. Meanwhile, Vernon Halliday is struggling to increase the readership of his newspaper. Everything seems to break right for him when he is given compromising photographs of the political star Julian Garmony by Molly’s husband, George.

Vernon struggles as to whether he should print these photographs to increase circulation - his friend Clive Linley thinks that it is a very bad idea – but eventually he decides to go ahead and do so. Unfortunately, it all backfires and he eventually is forced out at the paper and is regarded as a disgrace.

In a similar vein, Linley is walking on his vacation in the Lake District and he discovers his elusive melody within his mind. He is struggling to get back to write it all down when he happens upon a physical struggle between a man (whom we later find out is a serial rapist) and a woman. Rather than risk losing the melody in his head, Linley decides not to intervene.

Through these various decisions, Linley and Halliday eventually grow to despise one another - mostly through a series of miscommunications and misunderstandings between the two. Things go from bad to worse and these two former friends eventually engage in mutual murder of one another after both hiring the services of folks whom are taking euthanasia a bit too far.

One of my favorite aspects of this novel is in the description of the deteriorating friendship between Clive Linley and Vernon Halliday. Instead of actually communicating their feelings and agreeing to disagree, things just spiral out of control.

Maybe not the most interesting plot of the McEwan novels, but as always, his writing is awesome.
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Amsterdam

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