Ian McEwan

Writer, 69

my generation has been extraordinarily lucky: increasing prosperity, technological optimism. I was the first person in any direction of my family to go to university, or even stay on at school past 16. And as a writer, I lived through that moment where publishing cast off its rather dusty, constrained gentlemanly quality. My children will struggle hard to have as many opportunities. I do worry about that. The whole idea of work is up for grabs, an ongoing discussion among radical economists. Automation and AI are coming and to do nothing about them is not a choice.

the last time i went on a march was about a year ago. There was a women’s march with a very anti-Trump atmosphere. I hadn’t planned to go, but I was with my wife and we saw it and stepped into it and were surrounded by people we knew. It was a nice feeling.

it is a bit of a problem that the machine that was once your typewriter is now a portal to practically everything. Twoand-a-half hours on Wikipedia used to be called “wilfing” — what I’m looking for. But I can be mid-sentence in a novel and think, “I need information”. In the Eighties, that would have been visiting a library. Now it’s 90 seconds. So it balances out.

i’ve never been unwelcome on the set of a film I’ve worked on, but it’s somewhat pointless being there as a writer if things are going well. You’re the only person without a job.

i’m a bit feeble on persistence, so I will often watch about seven episodes of a TV series and no more. I watched nearly all of Breaking

Bad and thought it was a work of genius. That did not impel me to watch all of it.

you hit your sixties and seventies and there is the danger of becoming less thoughtrich. The brain is not as muscular as it was. There is a slow brain death and no amount of Sudoku is going to get you off the hook. The thing you want to keep alive more than anything in the mental realm is curiosity. As long as you’ve got active hunger about things in the world, then if you can’t remember something, you can find out. If you lose your hunger for finding out, you might as well go somewhere and sunbathe. That is what I’m determined to avoid.

i love being a grandad. Wonderful to see

consciousnesses blossom.

in my mid-forties, i could still play

a good game of squash and I had the illusion I had the same body as I had when I was 28. Although all that was ruined for me on the 40th anniversary of the four-minute mile, when the fathers of the boys at my sons’ school ran a mile on the very same track at Oxford. I used to do a pretty good mile, just over five minutes. I thought, “I’m going to show these bastards.” We went off at a real lick and I ran myself into the ground: seven-and-ahalf minutes. Yet I still played a good game of squash. In terms of subjective feeling, I didn’t feel much different than in my mid-twenties.

if there is a difference between

hiking and walking, it’s intent. Hiking in cold weather and in mountains, you can’t afford not to be extremely well-equipped.

across england and to some extent

wales, every village is connected by a footpath. Still. You can drive 20 miles out of London and be on the North Downs on a footpath that has been trudged for maybe 1,000 years. You can’t find that in the States. It’s all fences and “Keep out” signs until you get to a national or state park. I’ve come to value the sense that “this is your country and you can walk through it.” Admittedly only on footpaths, but still there is a sense of connection to the land. The psychogeographic tingle is important, and I don’t get it in Upstate New York. for about six months in 1972, i was on the hippie trail in a bus with two American friends. Kabul, Kandahar, Iraq, Mazar-i-Sharif, Jalalabad. I don’t think I was a good hippie. I longed to be under a grey sky so I could think straight and get on with some work.

i haven’t written all the screenplays

for the films of my novels because I was busy writing other novels. I did so with On

Chesil Beach because now I’m in the position to choose, which is a rather nice position to be in. my late friend christopher hitchens once said to me, when I asked about happiness, that his ideal was “to work all day on my own in the knowledge that I will be spending the evening with interesting friends.” That’s the perfect balance. Cooking and knowing someone is coming to eat. Round about

7pm, some music, a sharp knife, red wine, an ancient chopping board. It’s a moment for turning off. My two sons are very competitive about who makes the best roast potatoes. I do.

reading sex manuals in my teens, the word “enter” I thought was hilarious. “Enter.”

i wrote a sequel to the fly, Flies. I still think it’s one of the best things I’ve written. I love The Fly. It earned its horror. When Jeff Goldblum’s jaw comes off, it’s for a reason. I wrote the sequel for Geena Davis. I made sure it was science-based. What happens is Davis gives birth to twins, they grow up into two perfectly horrible American teenagers, and all the time you’re thinking they are flies. Sure enough, slowly, they turn into flies. But, some disagreement occurred, I don’t know the details, between Davis and 20th Century Fox. They each own half the concept of The Fly, and neither can move on it without the other’s permission. This is what happens in Hollywood.

i can get by without reading reviews

[of my novels] any more. Don’t need to do that. It’s easier to read reviews of your films. With a film, so many people are involved that if the film is being pissed on, all the pee is being spread around 200 people.

On Chesil Beach is in cinemas on 18 May