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Top 500 Ian McEwan Quotes (2026 Update)
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Ian McEwan Quote: “Jokes against the legal profession were what the legal profession loved most.”

451. “Jokes against the legal profession were what the legal profession loved most.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “I made the enthusiast’s mistake of assuming that everyone shared my previous ignorance.”

452. “I made the enthusiast’s mistake of assuming that everyone shared my previous ignorance.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “To love her was to be soothed.”

453. “To love her was to be soothed.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “It wasn’t hatred that killed the innocents but faith, that famished ghost, still revered, even in the mildest quarters.”

454. “It wasn’t hatred that killed the innocents but faith, that famished ghost, still revered, even in the mildest quarters.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “What must it be, to burst out of deep infant sleep into the shocking singular fact of existence.”

455. “What must it be, to burst out of deep infant sleep into the shocking singular fact of existence.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Now human blubber draped his efforts.”

456. “Now human blubber draped his efforts.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “If I can’t get along with the father of my children, how can the world make progress?”

457. “If I can’t get along with the father of my children, how can the world make progress?”

Ian McEwan Quote: “It’s dusk in the second Age of Reason. We were wonderful, but now we are doomed.”

458. “It’s dusk in the second Age of Reason. We were wonderful, but now we are doomed.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “The money to buy even the cheapest of these things had been earned by Clive dreaming up sounds, by putting one note in front of another. He had imagined everything here, he had willed it all to be here, without anyone’s help.”

459. “The money to buy even the cheapest of these things had been earned by Clive dreaming up sounds, by putting one note in front of another. He had imagined everything here, he had willed it all to be here, without anyone’s help.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “But there was that essence everyone forgets when a love recedes into the past – how it was, how it felt and tasted to be together through seconds, minutes and days, before everything that was taken for granted was discarded then overwritten by the tale of how it all ended, and then by the shaming inadequacies of memory. Paradise or.”

460. “But there was that essence everyone forgets when a love recedes into the past – how it was, how it felt and tasted to be together through seconds, minutes and days, before everything that was taken for granted was discarded then overwritten by the tale of how it all ended, and then by the shaming inadequacies of memory. Paradise or.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “But first he must cover the miles again, and go back north to the field where the farmer and his dog still walked behind the plough, and ask the Flemish lady and her son if they held him accountable for their deaths.”

461. “But first he must cover the miles again, and go back north to the field where the farmer and his dog still walked behind the plough, and ask the Flemish lady and her son if they held him accountable for their deaths.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “She resented the way she was listening out for him, her attention poised, holding its breath, for the creak of the door or a floorboard. Wanting it, dreading it.”

462. “She resented the way she was listening out for him, her attention poised, holding its breath, for the creak of the door or a floorboard. Wanting it, dreading it.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “He did not want to see her photograph and discover what the years had wrought, or hear about the details of her life. He preferred to preserve her as she was in his memories, with the dandelion in her buttonhole and the piece of velvet in her hair, the canvas bag across her shoulder, and the beautiful strong-boned face with its wide and artless smile.”

463. “He did not want to see her photograph and discover what the years had wrought, or hear about the details of her life. He preferred to preserve her as she was in his memories, with the dandelion in her buttonhole and the piece of velvet in her hair, the canvas bag across her shoulder, and the beautiful strong-boned face with its wide and artless smile.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “The details were apt and convincing enough, but surely not so very difficult to marshal if you were halfway observant and had the patience to write them all down.”

464. “The details were apt and convincing enough, but surely not so very difficult to marshal if you were halfway observant and had the patience to write them all down.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “He doesn’t trouble himself with closing the shutter – total darkness, sense deprivation, might activate his thoughts. Better to stare at something and hope to feel his eyelids grow heavy. Already, his tiredness seems fragile or unreliable, like a pain that comes and goes. He needs to nurture it, and to avoid thoughts at all costs.”

465. “He doesn’t trouble himself with closing the shutter – total darkness, sense deprivation, might activate his thoughts. Better to stare at something and hope to feel his eyelids grow heavy. Already, his tiredness seems fragile or unreliable, like a pain that comes and goes. He needs to nurture it, and to avoid thoughts at all costs.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “A consignment bound for Peru, Argentina’s ally, was blocked. But other countries, including Iran, were willing to sell. There was also a black market. British agents, posing as arms dealers, bought up the supply.”

466. “A consignment bound for Peru, Argentina’s ally, was blocked. But other countries, including Iran, were willing to sell. There was also a black market. British agents, posing as arms dealers, bought up the supply.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “This was still the era – it would end later in that famous decade – when to be young was a social encumbrance, a mark of irrelevance, a faintly embarrassing condition for which marriage was the beginning of a cure. Almost strangers, they stood, strangely together, on a new pinnacle of existence, gleeful that their new status promised to promote them out of their endless youth – Edward and Florence, free at last!”

467. “This was still the era – it would end later in that famous decade – when to be young was a social encumbrance, a mark of irrelevance, a faintly embarrassing condition for which marriage was the beginning of a cure. Almost strangers, they stood, strangely together, on a new pinnacle of existence, gleeful that their new status promised to promote them out of their endless youth – Edward and Florence, free at last!”

Ian McEwan Quote: “It was not always the case that a large minority comprising the weakest members of society wore special clothes, were freed from the routines of work and of many constraints on their behaviour and were able to devote much of their time to play. It should be remembered that childhood is not a natural occurrence. There was a time when children were treated like small adults. Childhood is an invention, a social construct, made possible by society as it increased in sophistication and resource.”

468. “It was not always the case that a large minority comprising the weakest members of society wore special clothes, were freed from the routines of work and of many constraints on their behaviour and were able to devote much of their time to play. It should be remembered that childhood is not a natural occurrence. There was a time when children were treated like small adults. Childhood is an invention, a social construct, made possible by society as it increased in sophistication and resource.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Get in first and shape the terms.”

469. “Get in first and shape the terms.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “He should take a different bank card to replace one that was out of date. Cars no longer had CD players, so he should look one out if he was to play her favourite disc.”

470. “He should take a different bank card to replace one that was out of date. Cars no longer had CD players, so he should look one out if he was to play her favourite disc.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “My own small discovery has been that this change is possible, it is within our power. Without a revolution of the inner life, however slow, all our big designs are worthless. The work we have to do is with ourselves if we’re going to be at peace with each other, I’m not saying it’ll happen. There’s a good chance it won’t. I’m saying it’s our only chance.”

471. “My own small discovery has been that this change is possible, it is within our power. Without a revolution of the inner life, however slow, all our big designs are worthless. The work we have to do is with ourselves if we’re going to be at peace with each other, I’m not saying it’ll happen. There’s a good chance it won’t. I’m saying it’s our only chance.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Turning points are the inventions of storytellers and dramatists, a necessary mechanism when a life is reduced to, traduced by a plot, when a morality must be distilled from a sequence of actions, when an audience must be sent home with something unforgettable to mark a character’s growth.”

472. “Turning points are the inventions of storytellers and dramatists, a necessary mechanism when a life is reduced to, traduced by a plot, when a morality must be distilled from a sequence of actions, when an audience must be sent home with something unforgettable to mark a character’s growth.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Why would the world configure itself so harshly?”

473. “Why would the world configure itself so harshly?”

Ian McEwan Quote: “She felt like a hospital patient who longs for her kindly visitor to leave so she can resume being ill.”

474. “She felt like a hospital patient who longs for her kindly visitor to leave so she can resume being ill.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “The organ played a familiar introduction. Ever since his truculent fourth form at Berners Hall, he could not bring himself to sing a hymn. However sweet the melodies or the rhythm of the lines he could not get past the embarrassment of their blatant or childish untruths. But the point was not to believe but to join in, to be part of the community.”

475. “The organ played a familiar introduction. Ever since his truculent fourth form at Berners Hall, he could not bring himself to sing a hymn. However sweet the melodies or the rhythm of the lines he could not get past the embarrassment of their blatant or childish untruths. But the point was not to believe but to join in, to be part of the community.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Growing up in a cathedral precinct, what did I know of the absurdities of communism, of how brave man and women in bleak and remote penal colonies were reduced to thinking day by day of nothing else beyond their own survival?”

476. “Growing up in a cathedral precinct, what did I know of the absurdities of communism, of how brave man and women in bleak and remote penal colonies were reduced to thinking day by day of nothing else beyond their own survival?”

Ian McEwan Quote: “And there was something I’ve since noticed over the years – the mountain range that separates the naked from the clothed man. Two men on one passport.”

477. “And there was something I’ve since noticed over the years – the mountain range that separates the naked from the clothed man. Two men on one passport.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Get in first and shape the terms. He did so in quick short sentences, his smooth tenor’s voice as clear and precise as it was when he sang Goethe’s tragic poem.”

478. “Get in first and shape the terms. He did so in quick short sentences, his smooth tenor’s voice as clear and precise as it was when he sang Goethe’s tragic poem.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “His right hemisphere had died. He knew so many people who had died that in his present state of dissociation he could begin to contemplate his own end as a commonplace – a flurry of burying or cremating, a welt of grief raised, then subsiding as life swept on. Perhaps he had already died.”

479. “His right hemisphere had died. He knew so many people who had died that in his present state of dissociation he could begin to contemplate his own end as a commonplace – a flurry of burying or cremating, a welt of grief raised, then subsiding as life swept on. Perhaps he had already died.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “How liberating to discover in the modern age that he, a city-dweller, an indoors man who lived by the keyboard and screen, could be tracked and ravaged and be an entire meal, a source of nourishment to others.”

480. “How liberating to discover in the modern age that he, a city-dweller, an indoors man who lived by the keyboard and screen, could be tracked and ravaged and be an entire meal, a source of nourishment to others.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “I was pure and good. I loved it that they couldn’t understand how profound I was.”

481. “I was pure and good. I loved it that they couldn’t understand how profound I was.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Her college years felt like freedom to her.”

482. “Her college years felt like freedom to her.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “But there was only one inevtiable end, and there was nothing they could do but go towards it.”

483. “But there was only one inevtiable end, and there was nothing they could do but go towards it.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Now here at last were the beginnings of desire, precise and alien, but clearly her own; and beyond, as though suspended above and behind her, just out of sight, was relief that she was just like everyone else... It was undeniable: she was not a separate subspecies of the human race. In triumph, she belonged among the generality.”

484. “Now here at last were the beginnings of desire, precise and alien, but clearly her own; and beyond, as though suspended above and behind her, just out of sight, was relief that she was just like everyone else... It was undeniable: she was not a separate subspecies of the human race. In triumph, she belonged among the generality.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Our age could devise a passable replica of a human mind, but there was no one in our neighbourhood to fix a sash window, though a few had tried.”

485. “Our age could devise a passable replica of a human mind, but there was no one in our neighbourhood to fix a sash window, though a few had tried.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Instead, she found her argument in the “doctrine of necessity,” an idea established in common law that in certain limited circumstances, which no parliament would ever care to define, it was permissible to break the criminal law to prevent a greater evil.”

486. “Instead, she found her argument in the “doctrine of necessity,” an idea established in common law that in certain limited circumstances, which no parliament would ever care to define, it was permissible to break the criminal law to prevent a greater evil.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “I’m raising my glass to that love. May it never be denied, forgotten, distorted, or rejected as illusion. To our love. It happened. It was true.”

487. “I’m raising my glass to that love. May it never be denied, forgotten, distorted, or rejected as illusion. To our love. It happened. It was true.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “The temptation of the old, born into the middle of things, was to see in their deaths the end of everything, the end of times. That way their deaths made more sense.”

488. “The temptation of the old, born into the middle of things, was to see in their deaths the end of everything, the end of times. That way their deaths made more sense.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Their love would have space and a society to grow in.”

489. “Their love would have space and a society to grow in.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “These clever, amoral, inventive, destructive men, single-minded, selfish, emotionally cool, coolly attractive. I think I preferred them to the love of Jesus.”

490. “These clever, amoral, inventive, destructive men, single-minded, selfish, emotionally cool, coolly attractive. I think I preferred them to the love of Jesus.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Los relatos no se venden. Los editores suelen hacer estas colecciones como un favor a sus autores consagrados.”

491. “Los relatos no se venden. Los editores suelen hacer estas colecciones como un favor a sus autores consagrados.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “She was one of those people who could not say if one note was lower or higher than another. This was no less a disability and misfortune than a clubfoot or a harelip...”

492. “She was one of those people who could not say if one note was lower or higher than another. This was no less a disability and misfortune than a clubfoot or a harelip...”

Ian McEwan Quote: “They had been married six years, a time of slow, fine adjustments to the jostling principles of physical pleasure, domestic duty, and the necessity of solitude. Neglect of one led to diminishment or chaos in the others.”

493. “They had been married six years, a time of slow, fine adjustments to the jostling principles of physical pleasure, domestic duty, and the necessity of solitude. Neglect of one led to diminishment or chaos in the others.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “And these are only the ones I happen to know about. As soon as you discover you’re not the best, you throw it in and hate yourself. Same with relationships. You want too much and move on.”

494. “And these are only the ones I happen to know about. As soon as you discover you’re not the best, you throw it in and hate yourself. Same with relationships. You want too much and move on.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “But when I was an energetic self-important 10-year-old and found myself in a roomful of grownups, I felt guilty, and thought it only polite to conceal the fun I was having elsewhere. When an aged figure addressed me – they were all aged – I worried that what showed in my face was pity.”

495. “But when I was an energetic self-important 10-year-old and found myself in a roomful of grownups, I felt guilty, and thought it only polite to conceal the fun I was having elsewhere. When an aged figure addressed me – they were all aged – I worried that what showed in my face was pity.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “And if he had, he would not have been alarmed. A childless man of a certain age at the end of his fifth marriage could afford a touch of nihilism.”

496. “And if he had, he would not have been alarmed. A childless man of a certain age at the end of his fifth marriage could afford a touch of nihilism.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “The possibility that Julie and I were responsible for the disintegration filled me with horror and delight.”

497. “The possibility that Julie and I were responsible for the disintegration filled me with horror and delight.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “From beneath her, amplified by the stone arch, came the hiss of the breeze disturbing the sedge, and a sudden beating of wings against water which subsided abruptly. These were everyday sounds magnified by darkness. And darkness was nothing – it was not a substance, it was not a presence, it was no more than an absence of light.”

498. “From beneath her, amplified by the stone arch, came the hiss of the breeze disturbing the sedge, and a sudden beating of wings against water which subsided abruptly. These were everyday sounds magnified by darkness. And darkness was nothing – it was not a substance, it was not a presence, it was no more than an absence of light.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “Books are difficult to tidy. Hard to chuck out. They resist.”

499. “Books are difficult to tidy. Hard to chuck out. They resist.”

Ian McEwan Quote: “She was not in pain, not yet, but she was retreating before its threat.”

500. “She was not in pain, not yet, but she was retreating before its threat.”

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