![]() ![]() Autofiction typically shows what it’s like to exist in a single period of life through an assembly of indicative moments. It’s not an autobiography, but it’s close, much closer than the ‘autobiographical novel’ usually is, or than ‘autofiction’ is. ![]() The ‘lessons’ of the title aren’t meant to be lessons in how to write an English novel, but they might as well be: it’s the sort of book only an English man of a certain age would set out to write – and the sort of book such a man will one day inevitably write if he’s fully committed to his role. Ian McEwan’s new novel is as English as they come. ![]() Oddly, this means that the caricature of Englishness – the condition of being awkward, self-abasing, endlessly apologetic – is much closer to the experience of being English than you would expect from a caricature. It’s easy to be embarrassed to be English, embarrassed by privilege, entitlement and insular prejudice. There are duties to uphold, expectations to fulfil. Or at least a certain type of English novelist, of a certain English vintage, from a certain English background. I t must be tough to be an English novelist. ![]()
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