What We Can Know
What We Can Know is the 18th novel by author Ian McEwan, published in 2025 by Jonathan Cape. The novel is set almost a century in the future, in 2119, in a UK partially submerged by rising seas, and is centred on Tom Metcalfe, an academic at the fictional University of the South Downs, who is investigating a lost poem, read aloud at a party in 2014.
McEwan has described the book as a work of science fiction "without the science." In the book, people in 2119 call the first half of the 21st century "the Derangement" because everyone knew about climate change but failed to act.
Reception
In an anonymous review appearing pre-publication in Kirkus Reviews, the book was classified as dystopian fiction and described as a "philosophically charged tour de force". Kevin Power of the Guardian saw the book as a commentary on the liberalist movement in the post-Brexit world, noting that McEwan dons the hat of a "liberal critic of liberalism" and "compels us to consider the moral consequences of global catastrophe."Writing for The New York Times, Dwight Garner called the book "the best thing McEwan has written in ages" and "entertainment of a high order". Garner praised the many themes explored by McEwan, including the meaning of history and legacy.