The Sense of an Ending
Tony Webster, retired and content, receives a bequest from his first girlfriend's mother that forces him to revisit a friendship and a letter from his youth, discovering that his memory has been systematically editing the record in his favor for forty years.
Summary
Tony Webster narrates from retirement. He has what he considers an ordinary, successful life: a divorce that was managed reasonably, a daughter he has a decent relationship with, enough contentment to be going on with. His memory of his youth is pleasant and confirms a self-image as a reasonable, sensitive person.
A solicitor's letter changes this. His first girlfriend Veronica's recently deceased mother has left Tony a small sum of money and the diary of Adrian Finn, the school friend Tony considered the most intellectually serious person he knew, who later dated Veronica and killed himself at twenty-two. Tony doesn't understand why he would inherit the diary or what use he could make of it, but he becomes increasingly obsessed with recovering it from Veronica, who refuses.
Barnes's novel is a study of motivated memory. The past is an ongoing construction, edited by the psyche to keep a tolerable self-image. Tony gradually realizes that his memory of what he said and did at twenty is wrong in exactly the direction that makes him look better. He wrote a letter he has forgotten writing. He caused damage he has convinced himself he didn't cause.
The revelation doesn't resolve into redemption. Tony understands more at the end but is not forgiven and does not forgive himself. The novel ends on "There is great unrest," which refuses the closure the form usually provides.
Quotes
"We thought we were being mature when we were only being safe."
"What you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you have witnessed."