Our reactions varied but we all found things to like (or be intrigued by) as well as dislike (or be mystified by). The rest of us, including me, had mixed feelings. They didn’t like the EF character, and one described the novel as “an ordinary study of a crush on an ordinary woman”.

They felt the novel had some interesting threads but found it simplistic, repetitive, disjointed.

She enjoyed thinking about Julian the Apostate, and what might have happened had he prevailed, and she enjoyed reading about the wide range of thinkers who have pondered Julian over time. A couple actively disliked it or were “very disappointed”. One member loved it, describing it as a dense, compact novel which takes readers down interesting paths.

Coetzee’s tricksy books, like Elizabeth Costello and Diary of a bad year ( my review), because they also tread this strange fiction/nonfiction, novel/philosophy ground.Īt this point, I’m going to depart a little from my usual approach, and share some of my reading group’s discussion, because the book book engendered widely divergent reactions. In a sense, the novel reminded me a little of J.M. Here, he also catches up with old student friend, and ex-lover, Anna, who does enliven the book. Part One comprises Neil’s introduction to EF, up to her death Part Two contains Neil’s “essay” on Julian the Apostate (who was significant to EF’s ideas) and Part Three returns to Neil, now focusing on trying to understand EF with a view to possibly writing a memoir/biography. The novel, while told chronologically, is quirky in form. (Interestingly, the protagonist in The sense of an ending is also bequeathed personal writing.) Through Neil’s memories of the class and his reading of EF’s papers that she’d bequeathed him, Barnes explores various ideas, including how we live our lives (particularly in terms of friendship and love), and the impact and thrust of history (primarily through considering the so-called last pagan emperor, Julian the Apostate). This man is Neil, our first person narrator, and he maintains a friendship with EF (as he refers to her), through semi-regular lunches, until her death some two decades later. Elizabeth Finch tells the story of a man’s fascination with an inspirational teacher, the eponymous Elizabeth Finch, who taught an adult education class on Culture and Civilisation.

Barnes elizabeth finch