McEwan uses religious imagery to convey the embarrassment felt by Joe and passion of Jed’s beliefs. ‘…, as I saw it, to deliver me from the radiating power of Jed Parry’s love and pity.’ The use of the verb ‘deliver’ has religious overtones and suggests deliverance in the same Christian sense of Jesus ‘delivered’ mankind. McEwan also uses the phrase ‘radiating power’. This is particularly effective use of imagery as it conveys the idea of Jed being the source of the obsession which spreads out and affects those around him. Jed’s preoccupation with religion and his obsession with Joe are intrinsically linked. Jed’s strange behaviour towards Joe intensifies with his religious fervour. McEwan demonstrates this in their second meeting. We begin to understand Jed’s reasoning and motivation for needing Joe to pray. ‘The purpose is to bring you to the Christ that is in you and that is you’ Placing emphasis on the word ‘purpose’ shows Jed’s intent and ultimately the motivation behind his pursual of Joe. In a sense, Jed is using his beliefs as justification for his obsession.
McEwan displays Jed’s need for Joe through the quotation ‘He was watching my face with a kind of hunger, as desperation.’ ‘Hunger’ and ‘desperation’ give the reader a sense of the insatiable passion that Jed feels for Joe. McEwan also presents Jed’s obsession through the use of letters. These act rather like a soliloquy would and we are able to see the character of Jed without Joe’s perception as the narrator. The letters are perhaps the most disturbing part of the obsession as McEwan reveals Jed’s raw emotion. ‘Joe, Joe, Joe….I’ll confess, I covered five sheets of paper with your name.’ The use of repetition emphasises Joe as the subject of Jed’s obsession and the action of writing his name over sheet of paper is a sign of immaturity. ‘Does it horrify that I can see through you so easily?’ A rhetorical question appeals directly to the reader as we see events through Joe’s eyes and reveal an insidious side to Jed’s character.
Jed’s obsession with Joe prompts another fixation to arise; Joe’s obsession with Jed. McEwan presents this through Clarissa and other minor characters in the novel. Clarissa has serious doubts concerning the veracity of Joe’s paranoia. McEwan uses short simple statements from Clarissa to cast doubts in our minds about Joe. ‘His writing’s rather like yours.’ This is referring back to the letter and suggests that Joe has created Parry. The telephone call to the police also helps to reinforce our suspicion that Joe is obsessed with Jed as Joe is insistent that Jed be dealt with however the police officer can not find any grounds on which to charge Parry. We can also infer that Joe is fixated by Jed in his science narrative. McEwan’s style often deviates from the plot to a narrative, mostly about science. ‘Self-persuasion was a concept much loved by evolutionary psychologists. I had written a piece about it for an Australian magazine’ McEwan uses this narrative to imply that Joe has used ‘self- persuasion’ to convince himself that Jed is obsessed with him and his fixation has grown to such an extent, it has flowed over into his work and every thought.
McEwan develops three other forms of obsession through the characters of Clarissa, Joe and Jed. Clarissa is representing art, Joe, science and Jed, religion. Here we see other kinds of passion that do not directly link to Joe and Jed. ‘Clarissa Mellon was also in love with another man, but with his two hundredth birthday coming up he was little trouble.’ McEwan uses the motif of love to express Clarissa’s obsession with literature, in particular Keats. McEwan demonstrates this during the accident. ‘She told me how a scrap of Milton had flashed before her: Hurl’d headlong flaming from th’Ethereal.’ It is unusual and shows a love of subject that Clarissa would be able to relate a terrible disaster to literature. Joe’s love of science and rationalising is more evident in the novel as he is the narrator. Descriptions are made using very analytical and scientific vocabulary and Joe relates everyday situations back to science. ‘The ice bucket sat within a rhombus of sunlight’ McEwan chooses to describe the light as a ‘rhombus’ as it highlights Joe’s mathematical side. ‘Two bands were entwined in a double helix’…….to suggest the twenty amino acids on to which the three letter codons were mapped’ McEwan uses the brooch as an object to draw out Joe’s analytical characteristics through the word ‘double helix’ and displays his knowledge of science.
The theme of obsession is vital to the novel as a whole and permeates every aspect of the narrative. The obsession is used to invoke a response from the reader, particularly in the case of Jed and Joe as we feel repulsed and disturbed by Jed’s language and feelings. We are also as readers, directly affected by Joe’s love of science. It is evident throughout the novel since often Joe tries to rationalise his problems by making links to science. Finally, it is Jed’s passion for religion that he justifies his obsession and Joe who fuels it.
