Universität Rostock
Institut für Anglistik & Amerikanistik
Proseminar: "Contemporary British Fiction"
4. Fachsemester

“Black Dogs” by Ian McEwan

von: Claudia Rittig

Contents

1. Introduction and plot of the book 3

2. June′s character 4

3. Bernard′s character 5

4. The standpoint of the narrator Jeremy 6

5. Bibliography 9

1. Introduction and plot of the book

The book “Black Dogs” by Ian McEwan is about June and Bernard Tremaine and the incompatibility of their different worldviews and corresponding lifestyles. Their first encounter is in 1944 at their workplace, an office in Senate House, Bloomsbury, London, where June works as a linguist doing “… translation work for a project involving the adaptation of treadle sewing machines to power generation” (p. 135) and Bernard, originally a Cambridge science graduate, has “… a desk job peripherally connected with the intelligence services.” (p. 135). Two years later, the newly-weds sign up as members of the Communist Party, leave their jobs and travel to the former battlefields of Europe with the intention of building a new Europe. During their honeymoon they also spend some time in the south of France where June is (almost) attacked by two huge black dogs. She manages to drive them away but is deeply frightened. She sees them as an encounter with evil. Nevertheless June really enjoys the countryside of this area and buys a house there. Unfortunately, hers and Bernard′s worldviews are too different to combine and they live more and more often apart from each other. Their children grow up partly in England and partly in France. Whereas June leaves the Communist Party after a few months, due to the difference between Communist ideas and the way these ideas were put into practice, Bernard stays for approximately 10 years. June retreats to her house in France and starts writing books about wild flowers and meditation. Bernard joins the labour Party and runs as a candidate for them. He writes books as well, often appears on TV and radio and works on government committees on broadcasting, the environment and pornography. Unfortunately, later in her life, June is taken ill with probably incurable cancer and decides to return to England to spend her last days in a home. Jeremy, her son-in-law, very often meets her and intends to write a memoir about her life. Before he even starts to write it June dies but he has been taking notes of their chats. Bernard, although having lived estranged and separated from his wife, is very sad. Nonetheless he has to cope with it and about two years later, Bernard and Jeremy fly to Berlin where the Wall has just come down.

2. June′s character

As mentioned before June and Bernard have very contrasting characters. One of the main features of June′s character is her love for nature. A major proof for this is her buying a house in the south of France to live in the countryside (p. 170). She has a passion for wild flowers and is truly an expert on them (p. 35). Her love for nature becomes very clear at Bernard′s and June′s trip to the Dolmen de la Prunarede when she just wants to sit there and watch nature. June would never kill an insect either, as Bernard would for his collection of insects. She is horrified by his ‘addiction’ of collecting animals and labelling them and cannot understand why Bernard kills an animal only for the sake of the collection (p. 76). In her opinion people should live in harmony with nature and the universe and see it as a unity. For this reason June practises meditation and writes books about meditating (p. 172). She takes her attitude of mind from Lao Tzu′s ‘The Way of Tao’ (p. 35). June is deeply convinced of the existence of a higher power, like nature or God (p. 43: “… call it God if you want.”) and believes in evil, she even says “… the evil...lives in us all.” (p. 172). In addition to that, she believes that if someone kills an animal he will be punished for this. When Bernard and June are both standing at the small station in southern France waiting for the train Bernard wants to kill a dragonfly to add it to his collection. June deeply objects to this. At this time she is already pregnant and fears nature could wish to take revenge for the killing of the insect in the form of making something happen to her unborn child (p. 76). When Jenny, later Jeremy′s wife, is born, she has a sixth finger. June sees this as nature′s revenge.

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