“Atonement” is the story a woman’s deep desire to atone for a mistake she committed as a 13-year old. The story begins in 1935, and Briony is a young, fanciful girl imagining stories and evading adulthood on her family’s country estate. Her misinterpretation of several sexually-charged encounters between her older sister Cecilia and beau Robbie, leads her to implicate Robbie in a crime he did not commit. Maturity and experience come to Briony with time, and she realizes the gravity of her error. Briony looks for a path in life to help her amend for her childhood mistake, becoming a nurse during the Second World War and witnessing the horrific injuries and deaths of young soldiers. Eventually she does pursue her passion for writing and composes her own novel to tell the true story of her mistake and vindicate Robbie for all time.
Anyone familiar with McEwan’s earlier novels will be surprised by the voice and pace of this novel. The novel opens with a flowery description of the Tallis family estate and the whimsical musings of young Briony. Chapters of shifting perspectives follow that set up the turning point of the novel: Briony’s identification of Robbie as her cousin’s attacker. As described in the author’s own words during the course of the novel, the writing style is “cloying” and extravagant. Fans of flowery similes and spectacular metaphors will enjoy McEwan’s imagery-laden descriptions, but even the most patient of readers will frequently wonder when the author is going to get to his point.
The aggravation of the writing style aside, the novel is a worthwhile slog. McEwan dedicates the central portion of the novel to Robbie’s experiences as a soldier in France during the war. He cleverly merges the horrors of war with Robbie’s passionate desire to return to Cecilia, her promise to wait for him pushing him to survive against difficult odds. The troops are on the retreat, and the overwhelming feeling of defeat and despair mimics the catastrophic end to Robbie’s own story in the first part of the novel.
Patience pays off with the final part of the novel. Briony finally plucks up the courage to visit Cecilia and discovers Robbie living with her sister. Despite Robbie’s violent anger towards Briony, both Briony and the reader are finally relieved to discover that Cecilia and Robbie’s relationship has survived. Briony’s mistake has not kept the lovers from each other, and the novel can end on a positive note.
Happily, this novel is no Disney movie, and the ending is not so simple. It is difficult to reconcile the behavior of Cecilia and Robbie in this final scene with the characters so lovingly detailed in the beginning of the book. Perhaps time and trials have hardened them, but no evidence in the novel lends itself to these dubious diverges in character. Briony is an old woman now, and she has written her final story, her atonement. It is difficult to discern whether the encounter with her sister is a matter of fact or whether it is fiction created within the author’s mind to assuage her conscience after so many years of guilt.
This final twist of the novel that leaves the fate of the characters to the reader’s imagination is what makes the novel so clever and worthwhile. McEwan’s thorough details and interlocking incidents result in a story that is carefully put together and complete
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