Ian McEwan Returns - Section 1




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ClassGraphic Present reality is dystopian enough, you say? Don’t let that deter you from reading Ian McEwan's glorious new novel What We Can Know (Alfred A. Knopf, 2025), a literary mystery, a love story, and a futuristic commentary on human life rolled into one, limned with McEwan's famously precise and elegant prose. In the year 2119, in a world altered by rising seas and a nuclear accident, Thomas Metcalfe is a scholar whose area of expertise is English literature from 1990–2030. Because Metcalfe is researching a celebratory event that took place in 2014, that event and the personalities involved become the central focus of the novel, thus enabling the novel to take the long view on our era. Nostalgic for the past, Metcalfe reflects on what happened to change human life, as well as on the realities of 2119. McEwan, with his penetrating grasp of human psychology and his fascination with science, depicts a damaged world but one where beauty, love, and hope continue to exist. Join us for a rich discussion. (Note: participants will need to read about 75 pages per week.)
 

Class Details

4 Session(s)
Weekly - Tue

Location
Virtual - Any Location

Instructor
Multiple

Tuition: 

$0.00

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Schedule Information

Date(s) Class Days Times Location Instructor(s)
1/20/2026 - 2/10/2026 Weekly - Tue 01:15 PM - 03:15 PM N/A, Virtual - Any Location  Map Michael Singer  ; Julie West Johnson 

Other Class Offerings

Ian McEwan Returns - Section 2
ID: 3571

01/20/26 - 02/10/26
Weekly - Tue

Location
Virtual - Any Location

Instructor
Multiple

Email olli@northwestern.edu for more information.
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