it's at least better than the road

i'm sure that we can all agree that among many fundamental differences between the two books which we have read thus far is the fact that atonement lends itself to a much greater extent to reading for pleasure, at least for those who would rather fantasize about bourgeois life in england than about being the last remaining symbol of human decency in a barren, post-apocalyptic wasteland. however, i thoroughly believe that, in addition to its greater entertainment value, atonement surpasses the road as an all-around literary and intellectual achievement, mostly because of the much greater maturity McEwan shows as a writer.

the book opens with an account of briony's creative process, in which she seeks to produce a work which will "inspire not laughter, but terror, relief, and instruction, in that order" (mcewan 8). in all her naivete, she assumes that as an author she is obligated to assert, without question, her intellectual superiority over her audience. her work must be impersonal, as any form of self-acknowledgment contained within is likely to portray her as human, and thus as fallible and questionable in whatever epic moral prophesy she wishes to impose on her readers. for me, this immediately brought mccarthy to mind. though it's not to say i didn't enjoy the road or respect him as an author, i do think he was, at least in the road, to some extent restricted by briony's same childish persistence in thinking that previously established standards of literature have created in writers an obligation to impersonality, lest they be deemed flawed as actual, non-writing human beings. even through the boy does mccarthy decline the opportunity to express the vestiges of his youthful ignorance, and the result is insight which, though often philisophically intruiging, is hard to believe to have come from such a young mind. the characters in atonement i find much more believable, and in most cases it is because mcewan is not afraid to imbue them with the flaws that he knows they must have, because he surely finds in himself, even as a writer. we identify with briony's creative struggles because we know that mcewan does too; we believe what we are reading because we know that the person telling it to us does not consider himself, even in the context of his own story, to be infallible or omnipotent.

unlike briony, at least at the book's beginning, mcewan is not afraid to inspire laughter, or any other indication of the emotions which we are often afraid to admit that we feel. this sort of emotional appeal seems to be what mcewan values most in the literary craft, and he therefore places the establishment of absolute artistic superiority, seemingly adored by both briony and mccarthy, further down, if anywhere, on his list of priorities. perhaps Cecelia's insistence that the flowers be arranged with perfect imperfection is symbolic, but at no point does he shove it down our throats. yet with painfully contrived lines like, "Who is it? said the boy. I don't know. Who is anybody?" mccarthy seems much less conscious of the merits of artistic subtlety.