- Paperback: 192 pages
- Publisher: Vintage Books; 1st Vintage International Ed edition (1 Dec 1992)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0679736093
- ISBN-13: 978-0679736097
- Product Dimensions: 14 x 0.8 x 21.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 2,586,510 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Before She Met Me
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Product Description
Review
Frighteningly plausible... stunningly well done Guardian Funny, sad and faintly ominous...making jealousy tangible and dangerous Spectator An intelligent and addictive entertainment... Mr Barnes has succeeded in writing one of those books that keep us up until 2am reading just one chapter more... few will be able to resist its easy humour and almost insidious readability New York Times Book Review Compelling Daily Express Concise and witty about psychology, ideas and love, in all its many forms The Times
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Book Description
'A remarkably original and subtle novel' Frank Kermode, New York Review of Books
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
There's no denying that Julian Barnes's Before She Met Me is an absorbing, even compelling, account of one man's descent from jealousy into obsession and ultimately to insanity. Graham, happily and then unsatisfying married, falls for Ann, for whom he leaves his wife and daughter. With Ann, a sometime bit part actress seems to offer him the solace and companionship which Graham has just discovered that he's been lacking all these years. By then, through the offices of his bitter ex-wife, he happens to see a film featuring, albeit briefly, Ann. He becomes obsessed with her past, convulsively gathering evidence of her former liaisons and boyfriends and even passing acquaintances. But he can't leave it there: and what he imagines his wife did before she met him becomes worse that what she actually did. Sad, funny and disturbing, Barnes' prose is as always, well-measured and quite elegant. Yet there is something just a little unsatisfying about this novel. Never quite convinced that Graham's descent is totally self-driven, the reader is left wondering about the machinations of his friends and his ex-wife particularly: the questions surrounding their role are never quite resolved and yet too closely drawn to remain provocatively ambiguous. Barnes has done a lot better.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Graham, a respected History academic at a prestigious red-brick university, leaves his sour relationship with his first wife Barbara (and his 12-year-old daughter) and moves in with Ann. Barbara - an unsympathetic character to say the least - divorces him and he marries Ann, whom he met at a party and fell in love with immediately.
Ann, an ex-actress in the cheap end of the British film industry, is now a successful Buyer for a large department chain, but things turn quickly strange as Graham conceives a burgeoning jealousy for her past love affairs. He and Ann have a good sex-life and are very much in love, but Graham cannot bear the fact that his new wife had a sex-life before she met him. His obsession with this motley collection of men quickly takes over his every spare moment as he visits obscure London cinemas where films his wife took part in are being shown.
This book is achingly, gloriously funny - but it is a one-note book. Brief, scurrilous, intensely anti-erotic and sometimes disgusting - you will laugh out loud at its protagonist, but in the end it turns out to be no laughing matter.
Ann, an ex-actress in the cheap end of the British film industry, is now a successful Buyer for a large department chain, but things turn quickly strange as Graham conceives a burgeoning jealousy for her past love affairs. He and Ann have a good sex-life and are very much in love, but Graham cannot bear the fact that his new wife had a sex-life before she met him. His obsession with this motley collection of men quickly takes over his every spare moment as he visits obscure London cinemas where films his wife took part in are being shown.
This book is achingly, gloriously funny - but it is a one-note book. Brief, scurrilous, intensely anti-erotic and sometimes disgusting - you will laugh out loud at its protagonist, but in the end it turns out to be no laughing matter.
Format:Paperback
This is Julian Barnes (JB)' second novel, published in 1982, when it was warmly reviewed on both sides of the Atlantic. The BBC may have considered a TV-film or mini-series (still a serious option). But in the age of internet, it seems largely forgotten and is rarely and if so, rather poorly reviewed, although it shares several themes with "The Sense of an Ending", which earned JB the 2011 Man Booker Prize. Well paced and written with plenty of fun, wit and shining with brilliance, this book deals a world-shy academic's fateful decline and dissembling.
Graham (38) had been married for 15 years with souring Barbara when he met Ann (31. They begin an affair. When found out, he moves in with Ann with a half-filled suitcase, leaving car- and house keys on the kitchen table, agreeing to pay off the mortgage and child support for daughter Alice.
He is a university lecturer in London, Ann a senior buyer for a major chain. They live in bliss until Barbara lures him into taking Alice to see a film in which Ann makes a brief appearance. When challenged, Barbara says it was for his own good to realize who she is. Graham asks Ann about her "Italian" partner in the film and she admits that yes, they did it, but only once...
From then on, he is no longer a historian of early 20th century British politics, but an obsessed sight hound: who else had Ann before she met me? He mildly questions Ann, who freely talks of former lovers, prompting Graham to more research: her other films, her books, maps and travel guides to pinpoint where and when she may have done it with others... As Graham's obsession grows, he dissembles as a man.
Can such a book, in spite of often being very funny and with engaging side characters (best friend Jack, colleague Bailey) have a happy end?
Graham (38) had been married for 15 years with souring Barbara when he met Ann (31. They begin an affair. When found out, he moves in with Ann with a half-filled suitcase, leaving car- and house keys on the kitchen table, agreeing to pay off the mortgage and child support for daughter Alice.
He is a university lecturer in London, Ann a senior buyer for a major chain. They live in bliss until Barbara lures him into taking Alice to see a film in which Ann makes a brief appearance. When challenged, Barbara says it was for his own good to realize who she is. Graham asks Ann about her "Italian" partner in the film and she admits that yes, they did it, but only once...
From then on, he is no longer a historian of early 20th century British politics, but an obsessed sight hound: who else had Ann before she met me? He mildly questions Ann, who freely talks of former lovers, prompting Graham to more research: her other films, her books, maps and travel guides to pinpoint where and when she may have done it with others... As Graham's obsession grows, he dissembles as a man.
Can such a book, in spite of often being very funny and with engaging side characters (best friend Jack, colleague Bailey) have a happy end?
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Well-written but forgettable
This novel is a story of jealousy; one man's jealousy of his wife's past. Graham has left his first wife amd married his lover, Ann. Read more
Published 5 months ago by F. M. M. Stott
Not even Julian Barnes can make this enjoyable
I am a great Julian Barnes fan, as I made clear in a recent review of A Sense of an Ending, and have been since I read Metroland all those years ago, but I had missed this one... Read more
Published 7 months ago by The Bagster
No One Escapes
I am well into a sixth book by Mr. Julian Barnes, so while I may have completed his entire body of work, I do think I can say this is not only a dark exception to his writing, but... Read more
Published on 29 Nov 2002 by taking a rest
Enjoyable but lacking substance
This is the first Barnes book I have read. Although I have glanced at many others on the shelves of my girlfriends flat--she is a new and confirmed fan. Read more
Published on 15 Feb 2002
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