ABSTRACT

In this essay, I use Ian McEwan’s 1997 novel Enduring Love to indicate the way McEwan turns the theme of appearance and reality established in Don Quixote from a herald of radical freedom into an instrument of skepticism, containment, and control. Whereas the Quixote used fictionality to open liberatory pathways not only for Don Quixote and other characters but also for readers, McEwan’s novels use the tools of fiction to foreclose the imaginative flights indicative of hope. Although McEwan’s novels are as stylistically accomplished and as adept at manipulating the play of appearance and reality as any in the English language, they serve a political program of reaction, one related to class prejudice and, perhaps surprisingly, to McEwan’s atheism and love of science. The relationship of McEwan’s characters to fictional truth is, like the author’s, nuanced and complex. No novelist can entirely disavow fictionality, but in Enduring Love, Atonement, and Sweet Tooth McEwan consistently treats fiction – sometimes coded as fantasy, mystery, imagination, or faith – either as a symptom of derangement or as a means of redirecting readers toward the truth of rationality, objectivity, and materiality. If Don Quixote charges in the name of imagination and hope, McEwan’s novels stand for the windmills that unmount him.

摘要

在这篇文章中，我使用伊恩·麦克尤恩 1997 年的小说《持久的爱》来说明麦克尤恩如何将《堂吉诃德》中确立的表象和现实主题从激进自由的先驱转变为怀疑、遏制和控制的工具。而堂吉诃德麦克尤恩的小说利用虚构性为唐吉诃德和其他人物以及读者打开了解放的道路，麦克尤恩的小说使用虚构的工具来阻止充满希望的想象飞行。尽管麦克尤恩的小说在风格上与其他任何英语小说一样在风格上很有成就，并且同样擅长操纵外表和现实的游戏，但它们服务于一种政治反应计划，与阶级偏见有关，也许令人惊讶的是，与麦克尤恩的无神论和对科学的热爱有关. 麦克尤恩笔下的人物与虚构事实的关系，就像作者一样，微妙而复杂。没有小说家可以完全否认虚构性，但在《持久的爱》、《赎罪》和《甜食》中麦克尤恩一贯将小说——有时被编码为幻想、神秘、想象或信仰——要么是精神错乱的症状，要么是将读者引向理性、客观性和物质性真理的一种手段。如果唐吉诃德以想象和希望的名义收费，那么麦克尤恩的小说就代表着卸下他的风车。