Quotes by Ian McEwan

“Dearest Cecilia, the story can resume. The one I had been planning on that evening walk. I can become again the man who once crossed the surrey park at dusk, in my best suit, swaggering on the promise of life. The man who, with the clarity of passion, made love to you in the library. The story can resume. I will return. Find you, love you, marry you and live without shame.”

“At best he read popular science magazines like the Scientific American he had now, to keep himself up-to-date, in laymans terms, with physics generally. But even then his concentration was marred, for a lifetimes habit made him inconveniently watchful for his own name. He saw it as if in bold. It could leap out at him from an unread double page of small print, and sometimes he could sense it coming before the page turn.”

“Theres 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.”

“If life was a dream, then dying must be the moment when you woke up. It was so simple it must be true. You died, the dream was over, you woke up. Thats what people meant when they talked about going to heaven. It was like waking up.”

“Everyone knew as much as they needed to know to be happy.”