SOURCE: Byrnes, Christina. “Ian McEwan—Pornographer or Prophet?” Contemporary Review 266, no. 1553 (June 1995): 320-23.

In the following essay, Byrnes provides an overview of McEwan's artistic and thematic development through the publication of The Daydreamer, drawing attention to his explorations of sexual obsession and psychic integration.

Considering that Ian McEwan won the Somerset Maugham award for his first book, a collection of short stories entitled First Love, Last Rites, there is surprisingly little written about him. In the eighteen years that he has been writing, he has often been misunderstood and plagued by controversy. The BBC first commissioned a play by him and then in March 1979, four days before he was due to record it, the management called a halt. McEwan was told the play was ‘untransmittable’ and the BBC put out a press notice that announced the ban and referred to ‘grotesque and bizarre sexual elements of the play...