The Comfort Of Strangers By Ian McEwan
Ian McEwan's second novel first published in 1981.
A bored couple journey to an un-named city in search of excitement. There they meet an enigmatic stranger who entangles them in a web from which there may be no escape...
This is a horror novel. Not in the gory, blood splattered, hack and slash meaning of the term - but horrific nonetheless in a subtle, langorous, almost elegant fashion...
You can't always tell what's going on in the mind of a stranger...and sometimes it's better if you don't find out...
The Comfort Of Strangers was shortlisted for The Booker Prize in 1981
This novel is a great follow-up to McEwan's first novel The Cement Garden. Very creepy and the ending, (although you can see it coming) is nevertheless, stark, shocking and disturbing...the fact that McEwan wrote the climax in an understated and clinically detached way, makes it even more so.
Like The Cement Garden, The Comfort Of Strangers is highly recommended for those who like psychological creepiness...
A film version of The Comfort Of Strangers was released in 1991. With a screenplay by Harold Pinter, the film stars Helen Mirren, Christopher Walken, Rupert Everett and Natasha Richardson.
The Comfort Of Strangers - Contents
- Plot Summary Of "The Comfort Of Strangers" by Ian McEwan
- Reviews Of "The Comfort Of Strangers" by Ian McEwan
- Buy "The Comfort Of Strangers" Novel On Amazon (UK Customers)
- Buy "The Comfort Of Strangers" Novel On Amazon (USA Customers)
- Buy "The Comfort Of Strangers" Film On Amazon (UK Customers)
- Buy "The Comfort Of Strangers" Film On Amazon (USA Customers)
- More About The Author Of "The Comfort Of Strangers" - Ian McEwan
- "The Comfort Of Strangers" by Ian McEwan On eBay
- "The Comfort Of Strangers" - Feedback
- Other Novels By Ian McEwan
- Other Novels By Ian McEwan
- Short Stories By Ian McEwan
- Word of the Day
Plot Summary Of "The Comfort Of Strangers" by Ian McEwan
Synopisis of "The Comfort Of Strangers" by Ian McEwan
One night, on a seemingly fruitless quest to find a restaurant that meets their exacting standards, they encounter Robert, a local man who is clearly sinister yet undoubtedly charismatic...he tells them the story of his life and somehow meeting this dangerous but extraordinary man invigorates Colin and Mary and they once again experience the unfamiliar joy of living...but this comes at a price...
Like hungry spiders, Robert and his wife Caroline draw them deeper and deeper into the web of their complex and disturbing lives until there is no going back...when Mary sees the danger it is far, far too late for escape...
Dark, menacing and ultimately extremely disturbing, McEwan unfolds this tale slowly and relishes every moment of the inexorable journey towards tragedy...
Chilling...but mesmerising too...an excellent read
Reviews Of "The Comfort Of Strangers" by Ian McEwan
- Late Reviews and Latest Obsessions: The Discomfort of Readers
- Late Reviews review of The Comfort of Strangers
Buy "The Comfort Of Strangers" Novel On Amazon (UK Customers)
"The Comfort of Strangers' at 100 pages long is an excellent thriller. It starts off subtly with a couple holidaying in Venice but rapidly becomes dark, twisted and chilling. McEwan writes extremely well, capturing the mood and emotions of the characters perfectly and depicting the darker side of human nature. It is an excellent book to get into Ian McEwan with before tackling his more famous works like Enduring love and Atonement. Read in one sitting 'The Comfort of Strangers' will get your adrenalin running and scare you witless. Buy it and read it next time you have two or three hours to kill."
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"This is by far McEwan's darkest book and he sets the mood perfectly. Mary and Colin are on holiday, experiencing some unexplained dissatisfaction with each other until a seemingly random encounter with Robert. Robert introduces the couple to his wife Caroline, and right away it is obvious something more sinister is at play. McEwan has written about the impact of strangers once in "Enduring Love," but Robert and Caroline are more calculating than the obsessive Jed. The conclusion is more shocking then "The Cement Garden." Robert and Caroline's exploitation of Mary and Colin reminded me a bit of "Beast" by Joyce Carol Oates, another novella dealing with similar themes. To go even further, when picturing Robert and Caroline, I almost visualized Minnie and Roman, the deceptive neighbors from "Rosemary's Baby." That may be a little extreme, but there's still some depravity there that is quite unnerving. McEwan's writing is so atmospheric, but it's what he doesn't clearly portray to the reader that gives it the extra sense of tension that drives this book. "
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Buy "The Comfort Of Strangers" Film On Amazon (UK Customers)
The Comfort Of Strangers
[1991]
"The pairing of Christopher Walken and Helen Mirren as a definitely twisted married couple is an inspired one, as is the pairing of Rupert Everett and Natasha Richardson as a younger duo who have decided to visit Venice on their honeymoon. The older couple, Venetian residents, is made up of an English woman and a rural Italian man (Walken, with an interesting accent) who live what appears to be a simple life.
Based on a stinging novella by Ian McEwan, the film is a study in intense self-absorption, to the point of obsession. Both couples are guilty of this sin in different ways--the younger one hedonistically, and the older one in a decidedly more sinister fashion.
When they intersect the obvious sparks--chemical, sexual, and otherwise--fly thick and fast and this makes for strong, compelling cinema. Paul Schrader, the director, has done a superb job capturing the atmosphere and tone of McEwan's novella. What always intrigues me is the "mixed" casting of actors from different countries in the same film. The presence of Walken, the only American among the otherwise British cast, provides an intense presence made all the more so by his out of whack persona.
This "out-of-whackness" reaches a crescendo at the film's climax which should not be revealed here. This is a strange, dark film that stings as much as the original novella and does so abundantly. McEwan, one of the most intelligent fiction writers around, cleverly sets this macabre story in Venice whose dark labyrinthine passages Schrader takes maximum advantage of, giving the film the creepy atmosphere it needs to make it so resonant."
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"Harold Pinter's screenplay, adapted from a novel by Ian McEwan, is a kinky contemporary variation on the sort of plot that made Victorian readers shiver-the story of innocents lured into the clutches of charming villains. The innocents here are an unmarried English couple (Natasha Richardson and Rupert Everett) vacationing in Venice; the evil seducers are a husband and wife (Christopher Walken and Helen Mirren) whose tastes run to voyeurism and sadomasochism; the dread lair in which the monsters toy with their prey is a huge, ornately furnished apartment with a spectacular view of the city. The director, Paul Schrader, dresses his characters in Armani and sets the camera in motion to swirl gracefully around them, picking up miragelike shimmers from the canals and beautiful but ominous architectural details; the languorous camera movements create an authentically gothic sense of catastrophe just around the corner. Walken glides effortlessly through his role as the embodiment of Old World evil. He gives the character a lordly, sinister air, and suggests, as well, that he's wearing something really odd underneath his superbly tailored white suits. And Richardson is characteristically amazing: she brings a touch of humanity to this rather formal party. The movie improves on the novel by jettisoning its dubious psychology and its pretensions to literary significance. Schrader treats the story as an elegant horror-movie game, a trick done with mirrors, and he carries it off. " -Terrence Rafferty
More About The Author Of "The Comfort Of Strangers" - Ian McEwan
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Ian McEwan - British Novelist, Short-Story Writer, And Screenwriter
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Ian McEwan has been writing fiction since the 1970's and has written many bestsellers and received numerous literary awards and glowing critical acclaim.... It is difficult to sum up McEwan's writing...a few words and phrases spring to mind...bold,...
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