In Ian McEwan's upcoming novel "What We Can Know," set in a UK partially submerged by rising seas in 2119, we follow Tom Metcalfe, an academic searching archives for a long-lost poem. As he unravels secrets of love and crime, the narrative reflects on history and human connections. McEwan emphasizes the transient nature of life and the legacy we leave for future generations. He intertwines themes of revenge, fame, and resilience, creating a work that blurs genre boundaries while provoking deep contemplation about our existence across time.
"My ambition in this novel was to let the past, present and future address each other across the barriers of time... We live our lives between the dead and the yet to be born."
"This is a novel about history, and what we can know of it, and of each other... About the present, we disagree fiercely. People of the future are beyond our reckoning, but we're troubled by what we'll bequeath them."
Collection
[
|
...
]