Allegory Of Truth:A Deconstructive Reading Of The Sense Of An Ending

Julian Barnes is one of the most renowned British novelists.Profoundly influenced by French literature,Julian Barnes is famous for his bold experiment and humanistic concern.Barnes won the Man Booker Prize for his novel The Sense of an Ending in 2011.In this novel Barnes,from the perspective of the protagonist and narrator Tony,in describing his relationship with Veronica and the quest of the truth of his friend Adrian's suicide,reveals the imperfection of memories and the inadequate of evidence.Deconstructive criticism,which emerged in 1960s,is a prevailing literary critical method.It intends to dismantle the certain and unique meaning in text and offers a free approach to literary works.This thesis is intended to make analysis on The Sense of an Ending under the guidance of deconstructive approach,especially the deconstructive ideas of Jacque Derrida's defferance and Paul de Man's allegory."Differance",as a difference that produces difference,is a key concept in Derrida's deconstructive theory.Through differance,Derrida subverts the logocentrism,on which the Western traditional thinking pattern is based,and reveals the impossibility of total interpretation.On the other hand,de Man believes that rhetoricity is the essence of language,and hence every reading of a given text is misreading,revealing the impossibility of univocal meaning in the text.Because of the impossibilities of univocal interpretation,the quest of truth becomes an allegory.