Powerpoint Notes

The Sense of an Ending

• Tony is the first person narrator in this novel. He is in his mid-sixties, divorced, and retired. He narrates this novel in two parts. The first part follows him through his school and university days. The second part of the novel begins with a letter from a lawyer informing him Veronica’s mother has left him a few possessions. This causes him to reestablish contact with Veronica and to reevaluate the story he narrated in the first part.
• Adrian is described as a shy but very intelligent boy. He commits suicide soon after he graduates from university.
• Veronica is Tony’s first serious girlfriend although they ultimately break up due to Tony’s inability to meet her wishes. She begins dating Adrian during their last year of university. She is very stubborn when Tony tries to claim the items left in her mother’s will, She repeats that all these years later Tony still does not understand, causing Tony to reflect on his past.

Important theme

This sounds confusing but if you think of your personal history, this stems from your memories. However, our memories are fickle and they deteriorate with time so in the end all that we are really left with is the impression the events of our memories gave us. This novel examines this as it pertains to Tony. He narrates the history of his life and that of Adrian’s and Veronica’s but the history he gives us stems only from his imperfect memories and some documentation.

Noteworthy Quotes

• To give some context, this first quote is set in the very beginning of Tony’s narration. It serves as a disclaimer to his narration. The history he is about to tell is not necessarily accurate as he is telling it from the impressions his memory left him with.
• Tony’s narration or his history is told from his imperfect memory and the documentation of his early years that he can find to corroborate his story.

Symbolism of a Photograph

Returning to one of the quotes on the previous slide, I chose a piece of documentation of history because it represents how history can become distorted as time passes. The particular photograph I chose was one taken of Tony, Adrian, Veronica, and Tony’s old school friends. However, photographs are very ambiguous and up for interpretation. Thus the photograph is inadequate documentation. When he first sees the photograph moments after it is taken, he doesn’t really notice anything special about it. However, looking on it forty years later, he decides that Veronica is turning slightly into Adrian. This new interpretation is based on his mistrust of Veronica and the fact that he knew that Adrian and Veronica would eventually start dating. Thus causing him to “realize”  that Veronica was interested in Adrian while she was still dating Tony.This new version of history that he is telling based on the photograph may or may not be true thus making Tony and unreliable narrator. Because of the amount of time that has passed, Tony can no longer be certain of the events that took place, only the impressions that those events left. This extends to more than just his memory of the day of the photograph, but also the entire first half of the novel where he describes his schooldays.

Visual Analysis

I created a photograph that capture a different moment instead of the one on Trafalgar Square. Instead, I chose a memory of a romantic night he and Veronica had in Minsterworth because Tony had repressed this memory until he began to develop feelings for Veronica again. This repressed moment represents the imperfection of Tony’s memory as he only chooses to remember things that align with his version of the truth. Furthermore, I tried to make the photo ambiguous. Because Tony remembers this as a moment that strengthened his relationship with Veronica, I depicted him looking into her eyes and made it ambivalent whether she is looking at him or some other object such as the stars. This picture will be a polaroid since polaroid pictures are developed instantaneously allowing for viewing of the picture moments after it is taken. This parallels the Trafalgar Square picture as Tony saw the picture moments after it was taken and interpreted it differently then than he did 40 years later. As for the content of the picture, there is a full moon because just as the full moon is the peak of the lunar cycle, the remembrance of this moment is a peak in clarity for Tony as he realizes that he is beginning to develop feelings again for Veronica. The colors in this picture are mostly gray and black because Tony describes the mood of this moment as “thoughtful and sombre”.