However he also shows a very opposite side of himself from science which is very factual and organised, this is love. His love for Clarissa shows through how McEwan has written this character; “a beautiful woman loved and wanted to be loved by a large, clumsy, balding fellow who could hardly believe his luck” and how later on in the book when Jed phones up and tells Joe that he loves him Joe doesn’t tell Clarissa because he didn’t want her to become involved. Love is a very random and unpredictable emotion as there are many highs and lows; I believe that McEwan has done this to show that Joe has many other sides to himself rather than just the educated, well minded person shown at the beginning of the book.
This very irrational side of Joe also shows when he relies on the hope that Logan might still be alive after falling from the balloon, and Joe even tries to talk to Logan in the field after falling a great height from the balloon. This shows that in events of panic and when Joe can’t see what is really happening at that time he can become very idiotic and as the reader you can tell that Joe may become too involved in an event and becomes very un trust worthy because he only sees what he wants to see, and not what is actually going on. This might be linked to later on in the book where Joe thinks he’s being followed by Jed in the library; this is where the reader may start to interpret Joe’s behaviour as paranoia; “all I saw was a flash of a white shoe and something red”. Joe links this show to Jed’s shoes with the red laces on the day of the balloon accident.
McEwan has written this novel on the base of Joe being the narrator as well as the main character in the storyline. This makes life very difficult for the reader as you do not know where or not to trust Joe or not because is direct involvement within the storyline. If the narrator was an outsider who could have an objective outlook on the whole situation then the reader would be able to trust what the narrator was saying because he is not involved in the actual storyline. However as Joe is extremely involved in the actual story this element of doubt comes into the readers mind whether or not he is actually reliable or not.
As the reader I would say that Joe is not reliable in his perception of what is actually happening to himself and the other characters in the novel. I believe that the novelist is playing a game with the reader, that he is withholding vital information that would make you understand what is happening more. Also, to do this the novelist would have to make the story available to the readers mind with a sense of reality and therefore inputs the reader into the story itself and creates you as a character within the story. To do this McEwan has used techniques such as “The Omen” and “The Self Referral” which are listed by Blake Morrison in the Independent, September 26th 1999.
“The Omen” is used to intrigue the reader into actually reading the novel itself, Joe uses ‘doom and gloom’ at the very beginning to hook the reader into the storyline and so to make them part of it; “we turned to look across the field and we saw danger”. Whereas “The Self Referral” is throughout the actual storyline as Joe pauses time and talks about future and past events. This gives the reader an insight into events to come as though they were actually within the novel and knew exactly what was going on.
The Characterisation of Joe is made difficult to follow at some points by the author McEwan; this is done to make it seem that Joe Rose is a lot more complicated than you may think and therefore it becomes harder for the reader to read into the personality and character of Joe. At some points I believe that Joe is very interesting and intriguing but other times I just feel frustrated with the character because of what he is doing as the narrator within the novel. At some points the story is very full of flow and this is where Joe becomes interesting and intriguing because you are finding out new things about the characters and how these all link to evolution and science etc. However at other points in the novel you just become frustrated and agonised within the storyline because of when Joe stops and starts the story like a tape.
To the reader this stopping and starting of the story just becomes incredibly annoying as you have become so entwined within the storyline you, as the reader, just want to carry on and find out what happens next but McEwan creates the sense of suspense while Joe stops and starts the novel.
In the chapters 1-6 of ‘Enduring Love’ McEwan has created different aspects of Joe Rose which makes the reader want to trust Joe but also puts a bit of doubt into the readers mind in whether or not Joe is actually telling the truth or if it is just paranoia. These come out well, and in such a way to not to show the reader just yet what Joe is actually up to.