Julian Barnes’ tenth novel

was published to wide public and critical acclaim in 2005, culminating in the nomination for the 2005 Man Booker Prize for Fiction. With his previous publications, most notably

of 1983 and

of 1989, Barnes had made a name for himself as a high post-modernist writer, experimental in particular in his approach to historical narrative. Geoffrey Braithwaite, the narrator of

famously asks “How do we seize the past?” (Barnes 1985: 90), a question that is symptomatic for Barnes” early fiction in general, as it is characterised by self-referential commentaries particularly about history, often concluding that history is something intangible, incomplete, never to be…

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Citation: Berberich, Christine. "Arthur and George". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 22 July 2011 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=22981, accessed 22 November 2024.]

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