THE SENSE OF AN ENDING BY JULIAN BARNES REVIEW

I’ve just finished reading this book. It’s very good. One of those books you feel you could have written yourself – he makes it seem so easy – but of course that is the sign of a very good author. It’s all about a man trying to come to terms with the past. About how our memory fails us and about how we all manage to somehow create our own history – to believe and see what we want to – not necessarily how other people see us or remember things.

He notes a few significant changes in the way we live. Namely the difference between “going out” with someone then, compared to now. These days you are only going out with someone when you’ve been asked officially and possibly after some time of seeing that person and knowing full well that they are at the same time seeing several others and “auditioning” you for the role. He says “this made me feel like a survivor from some antique, bypassed culture whose members were still using carved turnips as a form of monetary exchange. Back in ‘my day’ – though I didn’t claim ownership of it at the time, this is what used to happen; you met a girl, you were attracted to her, you tried to ingratiate yourself, you would invite her to a couple of social event – for instance the pub – and then ask her out on her own, then again, and after a goodnight kiss of variable heat, you were somehow officially ‘going out’ with her. Only when you were semi-publicly committed did you discover what her sexual policy might be. And sometimes this meant her body would be as tightly guarded as a fisheries exclusion zone”.

He cleverly questions life at different stages – “does character develop over time – our attitudes and opinions change, we develop new habits and eccentricities; but that’s something different, more like decoration. Perhaps character resembles intelligence, except the character peaks a little later; between twenty and thirty say. And after that, we’re just stuck with what we’ve got. We’re on our own. If so, that would explain a lot of lives, wouldn’t it? And also – if this isn’t to grand a word – our tragedy”.

Do your losses accumulate over time? Not just the addition and subtraction but the multiplication of loss and failure. Is there a chain of responsibility? Can you blame your dead parents, your siblings, your genes, society or whatever for your actions or should you “start with the notion that yours is the sole responsibility unless there’s powerful evidence to the contrary”.

All very thought provoking stuff and an interesting story to weave his thoughts about life through.

It’s small too.

Highly recommended.