The Sense of an Ending

just read the book (twice in one day) -- i had to read this several times to believe that julian barnes wrote this. i think after reading this most helpful thread- the theme is actually about fear-- not the fear of death (mentioned over with suicides of robson and adrian etc) , the fear of living, the fear of not being right- - the fear of "not getting it" the fear that the point of our lives and the realization that all you held to be true was just a illusion/delusion. OK OK--Now i know this is not an original thought- i see many agree with this. First let me say I loved the book until i got to the end. Then I was frustrated and felt oddly betrayed. Why? bc it didn't make sense, so i had to check like all of us did, what the heck happened here? So I went back and read it again and again, and did some work on thinking about this. This is how it went. I concluded the focus on plot was entirely wrong--the book was wonderful and thought provoking and meaningful,-- i loved the book-until the end why-- because i wanted answers-- i didnt get them and hence felt let down and the book sucked-- this was the first time i read it-- second and third reading i realized how much i still enjoyed reading it, because it was thought provoking, and the prose beautiful - and that's what makes a great novel for me. as masters of our own history---- the sense of an ending (for a second forget that was the title) made total sense to me. and i assure you i read, highlighted did everything as a lawyer to get the facts/plot straight, going back charting out the histories and timelines to absolute no conclusion. or if you will, "nothing that would hold up in court'- - and that's when i realized i maybe overlooked the obvious--- julian barnes or any author knows how to tie a plot together-- most of us have been readers our own lives-- we know an author of this caliber could not have unintentionally created these gargantuan gaps-- which must mean he did it intentionally-- and not like some of the reviews said to" just make it work",-- it's obvious from his previous work he's not 'that' kind of author---so was it possible that i missed the point? I think it's about the sense of ending self delusion-- and that's it. the point is we think we are all right in our interpretations of our histories, our certainty of our life and the way we perceive it. we are tony. the ending wasnt about the plot at all-- i finally realized (being a lawyer that was the hardest thing for me-- i needed it to be tight and make sense- hence my research on this particular thread to answer the same relevant questions) i think it was more about us (the readers) along with tony "not getting it". The focus of the discussion is all on how it was supposed to make sense -- but there is a possibility that it was not about that at all-- about tony's end of self delusion/illusion and making the whole thing understood. we the readers are tony. the book is a reflection of our perceptions/illusions/ whatever, but in the end it has to make sense. How many times in the book did tony say "if this were a novel" etc etc. How many times did he refer to "would this hold up in a court of law"-- isn't is apparent that barnes is saying this is NOT supposed to make sense. The only obvious answer if you think this through is that tony's desperation "to get it" is much like the readers desperation as well-- we don't get it do we? Or maybe we do. When you run out of trying to make sense of it in a linear and logical way, then you have to go outside of that and that leaves me with one answer --that this was intended by the author. the ending or the whole book was about as many others have said-- just the end of illusion/self-delusion, and most importantly- we are just all interpreting the past to our own advantage/disadvantage-- which is the point of the book-- and the point of the ending or maybe beginning-- julian barnes is no novice to tight storytelling- the reason of the ending and i believe it was the author's intent to keep the answers vague and open to interpretation-- possibly laughing to see if we the readers "would never get it, never have, and never will." I believe the answer is right in front of us. and perhaps the point he was trying to get accross-- are you focusing on your reliance on tight plotlines (like we perceive our life to be mapped out like tony does/did) handing you your answers so you dont have to think at all, or getting the message that this life doesn't make sense, much like this book doesn't make sense, but the journey was reading it and developing as tony did by understanding the gaps in memory and perception and self identity?? the "sense" in the sense of an ending could just refer to the point that the book ended, the questions like life and character to be continuously and consciously examined-answers we will not receive no matter how many times we re-examine this book or our lives- which in all irony we all are doing reading this book. What was it that ended really? Not the mystery of Adrian etc--not the 500 pounds--the only ending was the book with tony still on a journey-- his wasn't over--- or rather everyman's journey-who we all are in the end. and when does that ever end? there is no ending right? does this make sense? and does it have to?

The Sense of an Ending is one of those books that 1/ is well written, 2/ you cannot put down, 3/ It is light and profound at the same time, 4/ It keeps you thinking long after you have finished it, 5/ and you want to re-read it. It happened to me. Barnes succeeds at creating a very engaging story with terrific characters and providing food for thought regarding different philosophical and psychological issues. The mystery in the book is purposely vague and open to interpretation. I think the key to understand the mystery and the difficulty that Tony has at understanding it, is in the character itself, his perception of reality and how his memory works according to his self-centred personality. We like the character and become him, so it is difficult for us, like for him, to "get it" because we are seeing things from his point of view.. To get it easy, we should have been presented with a different book structure in which all the characters and their stories have similar weight in the narrative, or simply a straight forward narrative of what really happened. Barnes gives many clues of what he is doing through the philosophical reflections of Tony, who is able to reflect on life with great clarity but it is unable to see some things in front of his own eyes because he has a black spot in his way of perceiving reality. Many of the things in the "mystery" case are his perception of them, probably not what happened. That is why he does not get it. He is his own black spot. Ultimately the book is about the role of perception and of memory in our lives, and on how core personality issues remain intact through age, no matter we think they are not. After all, Tony despite what he says, is still the same Tony he was when he was when he was young. The sense of a ending is a brilliant reflection on what reality is, how we see reality and how we create our lives. It is also masterly at involving the reader, almost fusing it, with the character of Tony, so much so that, only after a bit of thought, you realize that you were accepting a version of reality that was, simply put, very personal to Tony, not the real reality.

Belle littérature anglaise, magnifique histoire, superbe intrigue quasi policière et réflexions sur la mémoire, la construction des souvenirs, la culpabilité, l'interprétation des choses. Bref, humain et finement psychologique, tout simplement beau. Existe en version française avec un titre bidon: Une fille qui danse et une version bilingue accessible. Peut être un jour au cinéma?

con un finale per me comunque inaspettato. Una scrittura lucida e malinconica che riesce a rendere bene il senso di rassegnazione che segue le disillusioni giovanili e la realizzazione della propria inadeguatezza. Insomma triste, ma non deprimente, e soprattutto emozionante e mai banale. Molto bello.

Don't be intimidated by its brevity. A little book with big ideas. Barnes, a runner-up for Man Booker prizes will finally get his just reward. Few books are worth reading more than once. This is one of them. History, false history, memory and false memory. A fictionalised memoire of Tony Webster reflecting on his adolescence with three then four friends, the latter, Adrian Finn, destined to greatness. Adrian's philosophical musing about a fellow student's suicide foreshadowing what is to come. "Life is a gift bestowed without anyone asking for it...if [one] decides to renounce the gift no one asks for, it is a moral and human duty to act on the consequences of that decision". Heady stuff this. Part One is Tony's admittedly selective and possibly faulty memory of his school days and his faltering romance with Veronica. His marriage to Margaret and the birth of a daughter, subsequent divorce and the marriage of his daughter are summarily dismissed in a page or two. Part Two finds Tony in advanced middle age realising that he never accomplished much and just flowed along the river of life going wherever it carried him. A fragment of a diary left to him in Adrian's will starts him on his quest of trying to set things right by reconnecting with Veronica. In the last couple of pages we learn Tony got it all wrong, "you just don't get it" as Veronica had always told him. Barnes has left us with a bit of a cliff hanger or at least makes us reread sections of the book much as Tony has had to re-interpret his own life. Book reviews in the Guardian and Globe and Mail do the book more justice. A true gem, Julian Barnes will be remembered.

I find it hard to comprehend how people can possibly give negative reviews to this excellent little novel. For me, it ticked all the boxes: very interesting, multi-dimensional characters, a philosophical discussion here and there, easy to follow structure and a superb twist at the end. The twist, I thought, was especially powerful because it makes you re-evaluate everything you thought about the protagonists and their actions. The book is short but so masterfully written that it says everything it needed to. The language is intelligent and beautiful without ever trying too hard. The quite lofty ideas are introduced with a light hand and the discussions are well integrated in the body of the novel. It was very clever of Barnes to put in, right at the beginning and throughout, the disclaimer about memory being such an unreliable bastard. Forewarned is foretold, so we know not to, for example, get all hot and bothered if we don't believe that a bunch of teenage boys could be that astute and articulate. All the main characters are excruciatingly unpleasant and, on the whole, thoroughly boring people, and this is where Julian Barnes shines: without undue sentimentality, he makes us care about what happened to these people, and we end up feeling desperately sorry for them. And, since every single one of us must have done something mean or shameful in our past, we might not like it but, if we're honest with ourselves, we will end up also identifying with the characters here. I didn't think it was ever about whether guilt can justifiably be felt for something other people did 40 years before. It was, I thought, about how we all screw up without meaning to do so, and we live with the consequences the best we can. I can't praise this novel highly enough. As a worthy Man Booker winner, it does one extra thing very well: it shows that to be full-on literary, fiction doesn't need to be difficult to read, annoying or pretentious. Short and certainly not sweet, 'The Sense of an Ending' shows us all how it's done.

A good read