'google', v. tr. UPDATE

A friend and colleague writes to suggest that: 'in Sense of an Ending' Julian Barnes 'is "doing" Ian McEwan, so then to me at least it feels more natural.'

She goes on to float the idea that JB's [entirely reasonable] sourness re. never having won the Booker might finally have driven him to consciously pastiche the double-winning McEwan by way of a fuck-you to the Man Booker prize committee. A grim theory, if correct - since they promptly handed him the prize.

[With thanks to AC]

'to google', v. tr.

Unless I much mistaken, the verb 'google(d)' - small G - appears in both Julian Barnes' The Sense of an Ending and in one of his stories in Pulse.

That doesn't seem quite right, somehow.

Really (really) good-looking

When people say 'She's a good-looking woman,' they usually mean 'She used to be a good-looking woman.'

- Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending

Carry on, Julian

The main argument, however, is that your children 'carry you on' after your death: you will not be entirely extinguished, and foreknowledge of this brings consolation at a conscious or subconscious level. But do my brother and I carry on our parents?

- Julian Barnes, Nothing To Be Frightened Of

Odd question, from a (bestselling) writer, 185 pages into a book substantially dealing with his mother and father. (Why else is he writing? one wonders, if not to achieve posterity.)