Crisp prose laced with subtle wit
Ali Ahmed plunges into an exciting tale
16 December 2011, 18:00 PM
The sense of an ending
Julian Barnes
When the Man Booker Prize for literature for 2011 was finally announced and the earlier short listed name of English novelist and short story writer Julian Barnes was flashed on TV screens and computer monitors through the internet, I wasn't quite surprised. Julian Barnes is, no doubt, one of the most distinguished writers of the present-day world, and his works have already been translated into nearly thirty languages, although Bengali, unfortunately. doesn't appear to be one of those.
Julian Barnes is primarily a novelist, having already penned ten previous novels. But he also writes short stories and has published three volumes. A couple of journalistic writings are also there to his credit. This Man Booker Prize winning novel The Sense of an Ending has already won the prestigious David Cohen Prize for literature this same year 2011.
This slim volume of a novel has almost an enigmatic opening with the protagonist------we shortly come to learn, he is called Tony Webster----------declaring he remembers---a shiny inner wrist-----steam rising from a wet sink as a hot frying pan is laughingly tossed into it--------gouts of sperm circling a plughole, before being sluiced down the full length of a tall house, and finally, bathwater long gone cold behind a locked door, although we have left a couple more of such snippets unmentioned. He, however, adds that he did not actually see the one mentioned last. But, then, he adds, almost as an afterthought, that ….but what you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you have witnessed. And that, not quite incidentally, turns out to be the leitmotif of this novel.
Tony and another two of his classmates form what he calls a gang, although it is actually an adolescent elite triumvirate in standard six of their school. They soon have a new member in the class called Adrian-----Adrian Finn. After warily watching him for some time, the so-called gang soon discovers he is too talented to be left out of their circle, and they soon form a closely-knit group promising never to be separated in life. But as happens with so many other adolescent promises, they find themselves in different worlds, albeit the worlds of different universities in England. Adrian, as could only be expected, goes to Cambridge on a scholarship, one friend to Sussex, the other to his father's business and Tony to Bristol to study history. He, however, continues with his liaison with Adrian.
Tony, in Bristol, becomes close to a girl called Veronica, who, after a few weeks' dalliance with the former invites him home in Kent to introduce him to his parents there. He goes there, passes the weekend with this rather queer family except, of course, the mother, comes back to Bristol with an unpleasant memory of insults and maltreatments, and continues with the affair with Veronica, who 'tightly guards her body like an exclusion fisheries zone'. But Veronica, after having been introduced to Tony's friends, starts liaising with Adrian soon transforming it into a full-blown affair.
Tony, heart-broken, left for the States after finishing university, had a couple of casual relations with one Annie and others and continued with his aimless journeys there doing whatever odd jobs were on offer for him at whichever place. In those days when mobile phones, internet or skype were not there, he could be traced out by his family back in England with a lot of efforts only to inform him Adrian had committed suicide.
He rushed back home, had a re-union with old friends and sadly settled for an ordinary life, although Adrian's suicide had made him philosophising a lot. He at last met Margaret and married her, although he didn't forget to define marriage as, 'a long dull meal with the pudding served first'. They soon had a daughter, Susie. But his marriage ended in a peaceful divorce, Tony settling for a single life, finally of retirement and reminiscences.
It all could have proved a rather hackneyed story had there not been a sudden twist in it at this stage. Tony one day got a solicitor's notice, confirmed his address and identity, and thereafter received the bequest of 500 pounds and Adrian's diary from one Mrs. Sarah Ford (deceased). He takes some time to realise this Mrs. Sarah Ford is Veronica's mother. Although Mrs. Ford's money and the solicitor's letter are delivered, the diary is detached and Tony doesn't receive it. His intense desire to receive his dead friend's diary, bequeathed to him by Veronica's mother, lands him in a prolonged exchange of solicitors' letters, finally leading to a meeting with Veronica at the latter's suggestion. But she doesn't hand over the diary, but a letter instead. Tony is simply horrified by reading the letter, written by him immediately after Adrian and Veronica's marriage, and since forgotten. The unmentionable filth and venom contained in it makes him remorseful. He again contacts Veronica, who, as always before with him, condescendingly agrees to a meeting, takes him to a sort of a back alley in town and he finds, through the windshield and window glasses of Veronica's car, five rather abnormal persons and discovers Veronica's attachment with at least one of them, a tall boy.
This incident intrigues Tony. He makes a second visit to the nearby pub, alone. A discussion with the Barman makes it clear to him that the rather autistic, tall boy, greatly resembling his dead friend, is actually his son, and is also called Adrian. He also discovers that the Veronica he has lately been mixing with is called Mary and is, in reality, Veronica and Adrian's daughter, although she is almost a carbon copy of her mother Veronica. This realisation drowns Tony into a sea of remorse and melancholy. The reader might recall Tony's assertion at the beginning that what you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you have witnessed.
Julian Barnes' present novel lives up to his reputation as a novelist of intellect. His crisp prose laced with subtle wit and humour makes the novel thoroughly enjoyable. His allusion to modern English literature, often dissecting T. S. Eliot, making mention of W. H. Auden, John McNiece et al and his references to Darwinism and the Communist Manifesto and some others of their kind tends to make the novel more of a cerebral affair than the ordinary reader might have been ready for. Starting with a definition of History, in a casual classroom situation, as ' the lies of the victors' through 'History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation' and, finally, arriving at the point to define it as ' a collective memory of the survivors' simply uplifts the novelist to a pedestal not shared with many of his class. This novel would undoubtedly bring an immense pleasure to those readers who look not just for a story in a novel but an intellectual satisfaction, too.
Ali Ahmed, a former civil servant, is a critic.
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