"The Sense of an Ending" - Julian Barnes

Hello Readers,

As a part of our studies we discussed ""The Sense of an Ending" - Julian Barnes". This blog task is a part of our co-curricular activities of our department which is given on this blog

“The Sense of Ending” is written by  Julian Patrick Barnes in 2011. It is a psychological thriller and a memory novel.



1)   What is the meaning of phrase ‘Blood Money’ in Veronica’s reply email?

Sarah Ford, mother of Veronica sends one letter to Tony Webster and gave him 500 pounds. In the reply of email Veronica she sends one phrase to Tony that “Blood Money”. But he can’t understand this word. Because of the letter of Tony to Adrian he commits suicide. In this letter he wrote about her mother and then their relationship started. Mrs. Sarah Ford and Adrian fall in love and the result came out that mentally retarded child was born. This novel talks about lack of love and faith. We can say that blood money here means the money earned by killing the innocent people. So, these all things happened because of one letter and behind Adrian’s suicide also Tony plays a vital role. That’s why she wrote “Blood Money” in the reply. 

2) How do you decipher the equation: b = s – v x/+ a1 or a2 + v + a1 X s = b?

1st Equation:
B= Baby is the result of relationship of Veronica’s mother (Mrs. Sarah Ford)  with Adrian with breaking relationship with her own daughter Veronica
B= stands for baby, child.
S= stands for Sarah Ford, mother of Veronica.
A1= stands for Adrian
A2= stands for Antony(Tony Webster)
V= stands for Veronica.

2nd Equation:
B= stands for baby, child.
S= stands for Sarah Ford, mother of Veronica.
V= stands for Veronica.
A1=stands for Adrian
A2= stands for Antony (Tony Webster)

It says relationship of Tony with Veronica, and her relationship with Adrian. And Adrian and Sarah's relationship multiplies b means gave birth to baby or young Adrian.

3) Adrian’s diary is willed to Tony by Sarah Ford. Why did Sarah Ford own it? Why was it in the possession of Veronica?

Sarah had written in the letter that Adrian was happy in his last days.

This means that Adrian and Sarah they both were together in last few days before he committed suicide and she had an affair then she would perhaps know about Tony’s letter for Adrian and Veronica. So it is obvious his diary would have been with her. Till she was alive, she possessed the diary and after her death, she wrote in her will to pass that diary to Tony. Tony had mentioned Sarah’s name in that diary. That can be a reason of Adrian’s diary willed to Tony by Sarah Ford. But that diary is with Veronica because may be she doesn’t wanted to hand over it to Tony.

4) Was the mentally retarded middle aged ‘Adrian’,
Tony’s friend who did not commit suicide and was suffering from trauma and thus gone mad, and was living with hidden identity?

Adrian is the son of Adrian (Middle aged man) and Veronica’s mother (Mrs. Sarah Ford). The mentally underdeveloped Adrian is the result of late age pregnancy of Sarah. As in the novel so many things are not clear because here we can see that Adrian is in his 40’s means he is middle aged man but his friend (Once classmate in school) is an old man. There are possibilities that Adrian was guilty of his evil and gone mad after this, and that’s why he was living a secret life with hiding his identity. And it appears more logical if we consider Tony’s narration and memory reliable because he says in second part that Adrian was the only friend of our group who has great control over his emotions and, he was practical in his life so he can not commit suicide just because that he made his girlfriend pregnant.

5) How was Veronica related to Adrian, the one suffering in care-in-the-community?

Veronica and Junior Adrian can be called step-siblings as Sarah and Adrian were the parents. We can also say that Adrian, who was Tony’s friend, was suffering from mental trauma and had gone mad as he can be called the step father of Veronica.

6) Do you see any missing block – some dot which is not getting connected with the whole or dot missing to get full sense of the novel - in the plot of this psychological thriller?

There are so many things that are not clear as the whole novel is depended on possibilities.

  •  Here many questions left unsaid, for example:
  •  How Veronica and Adrian met
  •  What were the reasons for ending relationship between Adrian  and Veronica?
  •  Why Sarah kept herself busy in search of other man
  •    What is the reason of Adrian and Robson’s suicide?


We are not told much about any character and their history so here we can interpret according to our own.

7)  Do you see any possible reason in the suicide of Adrian Finn?

We can say that in this novel many characters have many affairs. So if Adrian is in affair with Sarah then it does not mean that he have to commit suicide. So, it is inappropriate reason to committed suicide. Adrian  was  happy  in his last few days but  he was also suffering from trauma  because he  felt guilty  for  what  he did ? But their one friend also commits suicide because in his school life he made his girlfriend pregnant. So he feels guilty, and because of this he commits suicide.

8) In the light of new revelations, how do you read character of Veronica? Instinctive, manipulative, calculating, stubborn, haughty, sacrificial, trustworthy, Good Samaritan?

In the novel we find that Tony as Narrator and though this point of view we look at every characters. But we perceive that Veronica’s character is different from others.  Veronica arises in our mind as instructive, Manipulative, Calculative, stubborn and haughty but as time passes the story disclose in that she appears as sacrificial, intelligent, trust-worthily and Good Samaritan. It is all about to narrator Tony’s point of views. It may be that this type of Veronica is not in real one but narrator talk as their limitations.  Tony can’t think about beyond the boundaries that she is real or not. Or maybe something Good and shy Veronica.

9) What do you mean by Unreliable Narrator? Is Tony Webster classifiable as Unreliable Narrator?

Unreliable narrator is the one whose narration cannot be taken as reliable or whose narration is not faithful to reality.

Tony can also be called an unreliable narrator because he starts his narration by saying that “I remember, in no particular order”. Here Tony Webster also remembered his School days, Class of History, Class of English, Friendship with Veronica all these things. Here we can say that whatever the narrator is going to tell is the result of his broken memory as he joins the missing dots with his own perspective and imagination. But we can’t fully faith on these stories because it is the memory of him. He carefully told the whole story of his life but may be it happened that many things of his life he can’t narrate and it is the missing dots of the story.
The first part of the novel is all about imperfections of memory and the second part is all about inadequacies of documentation.

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