Sweet
Tooth by Ian McEwan is a subtle, moving book about espionage. There is a touch
of oxymoron about that, somewhere. No-one is killed. There are no guns. No-one
is shot, poisoned, dismembered or tortured, at least not physically, within
these pages. There’s plenty of anguish, however, but this is usually personal
and more often than not self-inflicted. Sweet Tooth demonstrates that drama,
excitement and suspense can be generated by a plot that puts people and their
relationships at the fore. After all, intelligence is born of people’s
thoughts, and is rarely generated by bullets or car chases.
Sirena
Frome (rhymes with plume) has been brought up with her sister by a Church of
England Bishop as father, married to a rather frumpish wife. The background is
dismissed quickly, but returns occasionally. Ian McEwan via Sirena tells us
that it’s not important. What is significant is Sirena’s love of reading and
associated ability to absorb texts at speed and, alongside that, her seemingly
innate facility for mathematics. She just can’t see the problems that others
refuse. She ought to have studied English, but pragmatism choses the
mathematics option and Cambridge embraces her, though not happily. She is no
ordinary mathematician, as her university is soon to find out.
It must
also be noted that Sirena Frome (rhymes with plume) was also a child of the
sixties and has developed a liberal approach to and a distinct taste for sex.
She is blonde, young and desirable, certainly not dumb. Wherever she goes, it
seems not to take long before sensuality bubbles to a boiling surface.
And
thus Sirena leads her author, Ian McEwan, into several relationships of varying
frequency, quality and intensity. There’s a bloke who realises, through her,
that he prefers other blokes. There’s an affair with an older man, a Cambridge
tutor with a complex marriage and, as it turns out, other complexities as well.
There is a colleague in her first job, facilitated by her complex older man,
who gets nowhere with Sirena and leaves for pastures elsewhere. And there is
Tom Hanley, a writer who develops a style that really hits the spot.
Sirena’s
relatively brief fling with the older Cambridge tutor leads to a recommendation
that she should apply for a job with the Civil Service. And this is not to be
any old filing clerk position, but something with one of those secret outfits,
MI5, no less. The talk and gossip about the office and the papers concentrates
on some weighty issues of the day – miners’ strike, three-day weeks,
Provisional IRA activities in Northern Ireland. As a woman, Sirena Frome
believes she is probably at a disadvantage when the tasks are given out, with
the big boys allowed to cherry-pick. They just don’t take women seriously, it
seems, and the jobs they get are jokes.
And
Sirena does get a job – cleaning. It leads elsewhere and soon she finds herself
at the forefront of intelligence work, reading. Questions arise by chance and,
of course, in a world where no-one trusts anyone, there are never any answers,
only suggested half-truths. Some of the pieces, however, start to fit, and the
picture becomes familiar. A colleague tries it on, but it doesn’t work out. He
retreats, but skeletons are left in cupboards where we thought there was no
furniture.
Sirena’s
reading is focussed, its aim to decipher, perhaps lead opinion. In the end,
isn’t intelligence about just that, what we think, what we assume? And who
decides that? How is it that one career flourishes, leads to stardom and award,
while others, apparently equally talented, wither and die, or at worst, stumble
along in anonymity? Is this an area where intelligence services can usefully
contribute? Is this a sensible question, given what we already know? And just
which writers and works have benefitted in the past from virtual state sponsorship?
Some will be revealed, suggested, at least.
This
is where Tom Hanley appears. Academic, unlikely and unknown, he has produced
some interesting work. It’s not especially noteworthy, we might fell, but there
is potential. Exactly where might that potential lead? And who might take up
the cause to offer support, guidance, influence? And precisely what role might
Sirena play?
And
it is here that Sweet Tooth displays its remarkable subtlety. It examines the
concepts of fame, appreciation, critical acclaim and success, and even the
nature of creativity, itself, in surprising ways, never via the head-on anguish
we have come to expect. When writers write, who is it that is in control of the
process? If art is the imitation of life, what forces shape the reality we
experience? When we say we believe something, or adopt an opinion, just how
much of it is generated on our behalf so that we might adopt it as a package?
And can values be promoted? Of course they can, but by whom, and for what
reasons? And who picks up the pieces should the whole thing backfire?
Sweet
Tooth continues its way, relating a plot that involves treachery, deceit,
double-dealing and a shifting of alliances that might constitute betrayal. At
the heart of everything is sex, personal relationships and self-interest,
however. The story lives through a passionate relationship between the
clandestine Sirena and her writer. Though she desires permanence, Sirena can
never reveal exactly who she is to her lover. Can he be open with her?
The
novel thus presents a story related from a distant future, a reminiscence of
what might have been. Throughout, Ian McEwan’s prose is nothing less than a
joy, delicately transparent and arrestingly vivid at the same time. But, by the
end, we are not even sure whose book has been written, or even who the real
writer might have been. Until, that is, we immediately start it all over again.
And then…
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