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Elizabeth Finch
Critic Reviews
Mixed
Based on 20 reviews on
"I'll remember Elizabeth Finch when most other characters I've met this year have faded." -John Self, The Times
This beautiful, spare novel of platonic unrequited love springs into being around the singular character of the stoic, exacting Professor Elizabeth Finch. Neil, the narrator, takes her class "Culture and Civilisation," taught not for undergraduates but for adults of all ages; we are drawn into his intellectual crush on this private, withholding, yet commanding woman. While other personal relationships and even his family drift from Neil's grasp, Elizabeth's application of her material to the matter of daily living remains important to him, even after her death, in a way that nothing else does.
In Elizabeth Finch, we are treated to everything we cherish in Barnes: his eye for the unorthodox forms love can take between two people, a compelling swerve into nonfictional material (this time, through Neil's obsessive study of Julian the Apostate, following on notes Elizabeth left for him to discover after her death), and the forcefully moving undercurrent of history, and biography in particular, as nourishment and guide in our current lives.
Book Details
- Publisher: Vintage
- Publish Date: Jul 18th, 2023
- Pages: 192
- Language: English
- Edition: undefined - undefined
- Dimensions: 8.10in - 5.20in - 0.70in - 0.45lb
- EAN: 9780593468920
- Categories: • World Literature - England - General• Friendship• Literary
More books to explore
About the Author
More books by Julian Barnes
What people are saying
Leo Robson is a literary and cultural critic.
For @prospect, I tried to make sense of Julian Barnes's new-ish novel Elizabeth Finch, which is kind of about Anita Brookner, kind of about Emperor Julian, kind of about biography. . . https://t.co/Sa1Mfr2Ijs
"Rigorous fun: a nice description of Barnes the fiction writer. His ambitions expand and contract from novel to novel: some more fun, some more rigorous. “Elizabeth Finch,” though charming, could use a bit more of both."
"Elizabeth Finch is a dual-pronged exploration of both personal and ancient history which asks, "Why should we expect our collective memory — which we call history — to be any less fallible than our personal memory?""
Critics’ reviews
Praise for this book
"Mr. Barnes has always enjoyed playing with form and style, the porous border between fiction and nonfiction. . . . Over the course of Elizabeth Finch, Mr. Barnes frequently reminds us of the potency of mythmaking." --Wall Street Journal
"Elegant. . . . Elizabeth Finch is erudite yet accessible." --Star Tribune
"A lyrical, thoughtful, and intriguing exploration of love, grief, and the collective myths of history. Barnes adds yet another remarkable title to his astoundingly remarkable body of work." --Booklist
"A novel of ideas . . . with barely a sentence in it that doesn't have some nutritional value . . . I'll remember Elizabeth Finch when most other characters I've met this year have faded." --John Self, The Times (UK)
"A singular tale." --Daily Mail (UK)
"Everything Barnes writes changes everything . . . Barnes's latest novel, must be read at least twice for the full force of its voltage to be felt . . . A cryptic crossword of a novel, Elizabeth Finch is a trickier and even brainier version of Flaubert's Parrot." --Frances Wilson, Oldie
"The book's central and most enthralling section . . . deals with a figure Elizabeth Finch esteemed as a kindred spirit: Julian the Apostate . . . A bravura exercise in nimbly handled erudition . . . [Elizabeth Finch] also celebrates the cast of mind Barnes most prizes. A connoisseur and master of irony himself, he fills this book with instances of its exhilarating power." --Peter Kemp, Sunday Times
"Elizabeth Finch ranks alongside Barnes' best." --Joshua Pugh Ginn, UK Press Syndication
"A new novel from Booker Prize winner Julian Barnes is always a literary event, and Elizabeth Finch . . . is not different. Wistful, thought-provoking stuff." --Sunday Telegraph
"This is . . . Julian Barnes . . . in his best ambitious high concept mode, serious and playful at once." --Lindsay Duguid, Tablet, *Novel of the Week*
What people are saying
Leo Robson is a literary and cultural critic.
For @prospect, I tried to make sense of Julian Barnes's new-ish novel Elizabeth Finch, which is kind of about Anita Brookner, kind of about Emperor Julian, kind of about biography. . . https://t.co/Sa1Mfr2Ijs
"Rigorous fun: a nice description of Barnes the fiction writer. His ambitions expand and contract from novel to novel: some more fun, some more rigorous. “Elizabeth Finch,” though charming, could use a bit more of both."