My Interpretation Regarding Novel The Sense of an Ending

   My Interpretation Regarding Novel 

         The Sense of an Ending 

The Sense of an Ending is about "memory and time”. The book opens with a short list of memories. Not all of which the as yet unnamed narrator actually saw. Immediately we’re on warning, if one of these memories is imagined rather than real, can any of them be trusted? As the narrator says, “what you end up remembering isn’t always the same as what you have witnessed.”

Meaning of Equation   

          I would translate the second equation as: Tony had a reasonably good relationship with Veronica. Then Adrian became involved in the same kind of relationship with Veronica. Then Adrian and Sara formed a passionate relationship resulting in a baby. The multiplication symbol represents either a relationship of lust or simply a positive relationship which had progressed to the intimate stage. It is clearly stronger than the relationship between Adrian and Veronica which was represented as being about the same strength as Tony’s original relationship with

Veronica.

                 On the other hand, if Adrian had been completely in love with Sara, one would think he would have placed the combination + and x symbol between him and Sara like he did on the first equation. The first equation is either a first attempt at using pure mathematical logic that didn’t quite work or else it should be interpreted within the context of the second equation.

                 To my mind, this equation would be translated as: The baby resulted from Sara having a negative relationship with her daughter Veronica so that Sara seduced her daughter’s boyfriend even though Veronica and Adrian were in the middle of a true love relationship. Perhaps both equations are true. Veronica and Adrian were seriously in love but Sara managed to seduce Adrian and Adrian enjoyed his relationship with Sara even though he also still loved Veronica.

Concept of Suicide

As for Robson’s death, Adrian quotes Camus:

“Suicide was the only true philosophical question.”

This leads the friends to conclude that the suicide could only be considered philosophical in an arithmetical sense: Robson, about to cause an increase of one in the human population, had decided that it was his ethical duty to keep the planet’s numbers constant. Nevertheless the friends are jealous of Robson. His achievement had been “unphilosophical, self-indulgent and inartistic”. When they learn that his suicide note was rumored to consist of just two words, “sorry mum”, they believe it to have “missed a powerful educative opportunity”.

Unreliable Narrator

    There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. Suicide has never been dealt with except as a social phenomenon.

      Julian Barnes’ has achieved something remarkable with this text, creating a work that is honest in its inaccuracy, that is genuine in its falsehood. Through the narration of The Sense of an Ending, its protagonist Tony Webster teaches himself a set of lessons about the erratic itineraries of memory.

        We could say that a reflection is offered on how the chronological time of life gets itself undone through the durational time of memory. But realizing, by which I mean assuming in everyday behavior, ourselves as divided by chronology and duration does not place us outside either. They carry us on forward in time.

      Even in moments of realizing ourselves as split by chronology and duration, we dance freestyle to the beats of being and time. Living implies constant narrative shifts, adjusting to the rhythms of our truths, lies, and indifferences Memory, as Barnes understands it and as Tony is forced to realize is far more edited than we'd like to believe.